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ANNUAL EXHIBITIONS OF THE INSTITUTE, 

IN 1848 — 1849 AND 1850. 



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ANNUAL ADDRESS 

Before the Maryland Institute for the Promotion op 
THE Mechanic Arts, delivered at its First Annual 
Exhibition, opened at Washington Hall Building, 
Baltimore, October, 1848, 

BY JOHN H. B. LATROBE, ESQ. 



Ladies and Gentlemen: — We have met to celebrate the 
first annual exhibiiion of the Maryland Institute for the promotion 
of the Mechanic Arts; and the numbers here assembled shew that 
the association is not without its friends in our community. Nor 
is it undeserving of public favor and regard, whether in reference 
to its more immediate objects, or in vieivof its remoter influences. 
It is valuable and important, not merely on account of the inge- 
nious inventions, the labor-saving contrivances, and the admirable 
workmanship which it may be the means of producing. Were 
these its only results, the interest of mechanics in its success 
would have nothing peculiar, and be comparatively small. But 
institutions like this operate in two ways. While they improve 
art, they improve the artizan. While they facilitate and perfect 
the labor of the hands, they call into action, rouse up and make 
active, the labor of the brain. And this last is truly their noblest 
function. The work of the hands, whether a child's toy or a 
monarch's palace, has the common fate of all human creations : 
but thought is imperishable, and once developed, expressed anil 
illustrated, lives forever. The Maryland Institute is one among 
a multitude of similar agencies, all engaged in the great task of 
uniting labor and intellect in the production of mechanical results, 
of encouraging and bringing forward, in aid of the limited powers 
of the first, the cxhaustless energies of the last, until labor, ceasing 



4 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

to rely upon the monkey^s faculty of imitation, shall be made 
capable of originating, as well as of executing, whatever may be 
necessary to meet the demands of an ever-increasing, ever-exaeting 
civilization. It may be thought, that this is an union that has 
always existed, because every individual has, from the creation, 
been blessed with both brains and hands. Most true. But, until 
within a comparatively recent period, the former among mechan- 
ics, as mechanics, have been almost dormant. It is only lately, 
that thinkers have begun to multiply; lately, not in reference to a 
lifetime, but to the history of man. 

Were we to attempt to dramatize that portion of the past, 
known as the middle ages, we would cause the curtain to rise 
upon a scene, the principal feature of which should be a castle 
perched upon a crag, close to some highway of commerce, down 
the narrow path from which men in armor marched, as they either 
hastened to rob a traveler, or to set themselves in array, for or 
against a sovereign, whose throne tottered or stood firm as they 
threatened or upheld it. The castle should be the representative 
of Power on the scene. 

Hard by the castle, and on the broad and fertile meadows be- 
neath its walls, we woulc) place a convent, almost like the castle 
in its appliances for defence^ to whose altars the men in armor 
sometimes came to pray, and sonnetimes to desecrate and plunder 
the holy things upon them; whose priests went backwards and 
forwards, meekly yet firmly, looking like men conscious of pos- 
sessing influences, often more potent than the steel of their neigh- 
bors on the hill. The convent should be the representation of 
Learning upon the scene — learnmg, shut up in stone, it is true — 
protected by moat and barbican often, but Learning still — living 
and bright — concealed, but neither extinguished nor impaired. 
Not far from the convent should be a fortified city, whose burghers 
hated the lord of the castle because he robbed them when he 
could, as they carried on the commerce of the day ; whose gold 
furnished steed and breastplate to the soldiery, with whom, at 
times, they warred j who held the balance of power between the 
baron and the sovereign, and who were destined to put down the 
first that the latter might take his place as their oppressor. And 
around the city we would have humble dwellings, single or in 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 5 

small hamlets, whose tenants, as they went upon their hests, 
seemed careless of castle, convent, or city ; who bowed their heads 
submissively to the loud voiced wayfarer, and did not raise their 
eyes to see whether it were baron, priest, or burgher that abused 
them, so accustomed were they to be spoken to as dogs by all of 
them. These dwellings, and these men, should represent the 
Labor of the scene, in our attempt to dramatize the story of the 
middle ages; those ages v/hen the thinkers were few; when it 
was scarcely the right of labor to think ; and when the dormant 
intellect gave small aid to toil. 

True it is, that were we to continue our imaginary drama, our 
next scene, and that at a date long years ago, would, when the 
curtain rose, shew the castle in ruins, the convent^despoiled, the 
city's walls thrown down, and fore-gound, middle-ground, and 
distance, presenting one vast picture of strife and confusion, in the 
midst of which Learning, with its charmed life, escaped from its 
sanctuary and its prison, was ever gaining ground ; but still we 
would see that it had, as yel, but slight companionship with labor, 
which, if with less apathy than in the days of the baron and the 
burgher, still went as ignorantly to work in its daily avocations. 

If, for the purpose of impressing an idea, we have attempted 
to place it as a picture before you, it has not been because the 
actual fact did not fully warrant the picture that has been drawn. 

As late as the settlement of this country, the state of the me- 
chanic arts in England fully illustrated what is here suggested. 
They were in the hands of guilds, or societies, the members of 
v/hich alone had the privilege of exercising the particular trade 
or calling which they controlled. Long apprenticeships were re- 
quired ; restrictive regulations were ordained; penalties were im- 
posed ; and labor, which should be as free as air, ingenuity and 
invention, which should be urged and excited, and not continedand 
punished, found themselves obliged to travel round and round, in 
a track beaten deep by the feet of centuries, as drowsily and as 
uniformily as the turnspit in his cylinder, and with but little 
more heed to iheir improvement in the task that was to be per- 
formed. The guilds, directed by those who liad already learned 
their trades, were naturally opposed to innovations, which, while 
d)cy would give trouble, could not increase the profits of wiiat 



b ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

was already a monopoly. Mind was not reqnired, therefore, m 
the sense in which we are now speaking; and the artizans of 
that day, satisfied wi(h doing what their fathers had done before 
them, and in the same manner, were mere imitators, and but a 
few degrees above the Chinese who patched a thousand jackets, 
because the pattern that was sent to them happened to be old and 
patched. 

Now, all this is changed. Labor has been freed. Intellect, 
in its relations with labor, has been roused and exalted. Means 
of obtaining information are multiplying in all direciionsi In- 
stitutes for the promotion of the mechanic arts are among the 
characteristics of the day. The public at large are operated upon 
by the new influences that have been called into action. The 
very improvements, which are being made day after day, serve 
to refine the public tasle and make it more critical and exactino-. 
The mechanic finds, that instead of being spurred, lie now wears 
the spur. The faster he goes, the faster he finds that he desires 
to go. The products of his skill, with which the public are sat- 
isfied to-day, they will not buy from him to-morrow. He has 
created a new want, which requires from him a new efljort to 
gratify. His hands have already done their best; but his intellect 
has only commenced the developement of its power. To it then 
he resorts; and he finds, in his consequent success, new proofs of 
the value of the union between the labor of the body and the 
labor of the mind. 

We have referred to (he settlement of this country as fixing a 
date, at which we have looked to the condition of the mechanic 
arts in England ; and we may refer to the settlement itself as bear- 
ing us out fully in the view that we have taken. The eaily col- 
onists belonged, in perhaps a majority of cases, to the middle 
walks of life, and were persons, generally, of intelligence and 
education. They were but little, if at all, conversant with the 
mechanic arts, or accustomed to manual toil. But the exigencies 
of their new home soon made laborers of them all. There was 
far more to be done, indeed, than there were hands io do it. 
Labor-saving contrivances became, therefore, at once important. 
Invention was necessarily the result. Invention was an easy 
task to the intelligent and educated colonist. It w^as only to 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 7 

direct the active intellect to the new emergency, and the thing 
was done. The hands soon learned to make what the mind had 
conceived; and it was not long before practice perfected a me- 
chanical skill, acquired remote from guilds and their restrictions, 
and with no apprenticeships save to the necessities of the wilder- 
ness. Invention is an ancestor with a mighty progeny. First 
comes the crude idea— perhaps in itself a blessing to mankind. 
Then come the many processes by which it may be carried out, 
each in its turn a novelty; then come improvements on these 
processes; then improvements on improvements, until the original 
thought, the first invention, — with its countless ramifications — 
may be likened to the Indian tree, whose branches, rooting their 
extremities in the ground produce new trees, with like powers of 
reproduction, until a mighty forest stands around the parent stem. 
Such has been the case undoubtedly in America; and the in- 
ventive genius of our people, which is one of their admitted char- 
acteristics, cannot better be accounted for, than by attributing it 
to the union of intellect and manual labor, which took place un- 
der the circumstances here described. Nor are we repeating 
merely the trite saying, that "necessity is the mother of invention. ' ' 
The results of necessity, in its action upon ignorance, are but small 
and limited. When Alexander Selkirk was left on the Island of 
Juan Fernandez, he built himself a shelter by leaning the broken 
limbs of trees against a rock, and supplied himself with food by 
running down the goats, whose skins furnished him with raiment. 
His true histor}^ illustrates the action of mere necessity. His fic- 
titious history, told by De Foe, in the life and adventures of Rob- 
inson Crusoe, shows what the labor of the educated can accom- 
plish. The novelist, to whom Selkirk told his tale, turned the 
sailor into one of the class, which sent forth the pilgrim fathers of 
New England, and made him act thoughout consistently with the 
character. Selkirk existed as an animal. Crusoe lived like a 
man. 

It is an easy task to fix the date of the first Mechanics' Insti- 
tute; but it is far more difiicult to determine (he commencement 
of the feeling which produced it. It has been well said, that 
great men are but (he exponents of (he times in which (hey live; 
as the lightning is but the exhibition of (he olectrici(y which lies 



^ ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

concealed within the bosom of the cloud. So it was with the 
association in London, established by Doctor Biikbeck. It was 
the result of a popular necessity. So were all the similar insti- 
tutions which have followed in its train. The Society for the 
Diffusion of Useful Knowledge was another of the agencies, 
called into action by an universal want — a society, which did 
more, in the publication of the Penny Magazine, to elevate art 
and artizans, than was ever done by the united efforts of all the 
demagogues, who, since the building of the tower of Babel, have 
claimed to be exclusivelv the woikinsf man's friends. The feel- 
ing which has been thus illustrated, is becon:iing stronger, year 
by year, and extending its influences w^ider and wider. The 
mind whose powers are improved, whose activity is excited by 
the demands which are made upon it, in reference to mechanical 
results, will soon cease to confine itself to the anvil or the loom. The 
merit of cotton fabrics will soon cease to be the exclusive object 
of interest to those who have learned that political fabrics are 
equally susceptible of improvement. The man of the anvil will 
find out, that the hand which forges a weapon, has the power to 
wield one — and he, w^hose skill and invention have secured him 
letters patent for a few years in a plough, will begin, naturally 
enough, to inquire into the validity of the letters patent, under 
which kings and nobles, wise or foolish, claim to transmit power, 
by descent, from generation to generation. 

Upon an occasion like the present, politics, in the limited sense 
of the term, as applied to party strife at home, would be emi- 
nently out of place; but a reference to what may be called the 
politics of mankind, may be permitted; and the opinion may be 
ventured, that the same feeling which has produced Mechanics' 
Institutes, which has carried, and is carrying, science and intel- 
lect into the workshop, has not been w ithout its influence, and 
that a mighty one, in producing the struggle which is now taking 
place throughout the world; and that while it has been the hand- 
maid of An. it has been, and now is, the handmaid of Freedom 
too. 

If all this is but a theory, it is, at all events, a pleasing one. 
It is agreeable to think, as we see multiplying around us a thou- 
sand luxurious appendages to our comfort; as we find new wants 



1 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. Vf 

created, merely by the exhibition of the means for their gratifica- 
tion, that the hands which have produced so much to be admired 
and wondered at, belong to those w^hose active intelligence; and 
constantly increasing information, are raising them day by day 
higher and higher in the social scale; that wealth, while it pays 
for labor, develops intellect; and so by its very outlay, tends to 
destroy the distinctions of which it is often the chief and only 
element. Accumulation in this way ceases to be selfish. The 
tendency of the order of things to produce, notwithstanding its 
apparent inequalities, that true equality which consists in equal 
virtue, equal intelligence and equal knowledge, becomes plainly 
apparent; and we have vouchsafed to us additional reason for our 
conviction of the infinite wisdom of Him whose thoughts are not 
our thoughts, neither are His ways our ways. 

But the moral and political results, to which we have here re- 
ferred, being of more remote accomplishment, want the interest, 
which attaches to the immediate effects of institutions like the 
present; and we are, naturally, more apt to enjoy, with eager ad- 
miration, the rare and curious and cosily wares and fabrics, ma- 
chines and contrivances, collected at an annual exhibition, than 
to speculate about the future. But the excitement of the public 
admiration, or the gratification of its curiosity, is not the most 
important object of these exhibitions. They bring the mechanics 
and manufacturers and the public together, to the benefit of all. 
They are the best species of advertisment that has yet been de- 
vised. They are most effective in creating agreeable surprises. 
They never take place without causing a thousand exclamations 
of wonder that such very clever things should be made in Ame- 
rica. They are potent in good. They are stepping stones, on 
which skill and genius may climb into the high places of popular 
favor. Year after year they have taken place in Boston, New 
York and Philadelphia, and the premiums of excellence and 
honorary certificates awarded at these places, have encouraged 
praiseworthy ambition and compensated hours of toil. They 
create a pride in the production of home, and are most influenlial 
in removing the prejudice too commonly existing in favor of 
whatever comes from abroad. Wo are slill dependent upon 
Europe for many things; but their number is constantly diminish- 



i9 ADRRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

ing ; and our mechanics and manufacturers, sooner or later, will 
have, at all events, the home market to themselves. Even now 
they control it more than the public generally suspect. 

A lady of taste and fortune returned recently from Europe, and 
passed the summer at a fashionable watering place. The rare 
beauty and exquisite workmanship of the jewelry which, from 
time to time, appeared in her apparel, was a subject of general 
remark; and, on one occasion, she w^as induced to display the 
w^hole of it, in its casket, to a bevy of admiring friends, whose 
judgment in such matters was beyond doubt or cavil. As, piece 
by piece, it was passed through eager hands, the fair examiners 
were loud in their exclamations: '^'Ah," said one, indeed said 
all, ^^you had such advantages. You have been to Paris, where 
such jewelry is alone to be obtained. With means to buy, you 
have had such opportunities abroad. But poor we, here in Ame- 
rica, what is to be expected. Those diamonds now — what a 
love — those emeralds how charming.'"" At length, admiration 
was exhausted, wdien the lady said: ^'True I have been abroad 
and enjoyed the opportunities you mention; but, after all, your 
opportunities are equal to mine; for the diamonds came from 
Marquand's, in New York, the amethysts from the principal 
jeweller of Philadelphia, and the emeralds from Messrs. Camp- 
bell, in Baltimore, and the entire workmanship is American." 
In some shape or other, the idea of this anecdote has been often 
expressed before. It is repeated now because, in its present 
dress, it has the merit of the strictest truth; and because it may 
surprise some of the audience, as it certainly surprised the narra- 
tor, to learn, that in the production of the luxury of jewelry, our 
mechanics have already attained to excellence. What the ex- 
hibition of the jewelry in question did in the drawing room of a 
watering place, the exhibition now taking place in Baltimore is 
doing, we may believe, for other more important branches of 
mechanics. 

There is one point, how^ever, in which, up to this time, our 
mechanical products are confessedly inferior to the foreign. 
This is in those cases where the elegance of the design forms a 
part of the value of the production. A tin cup and a silver gob- 
let are both drinking vessels, and so far as use is concerned, the 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. H 

rough cylinder of the one^ and the gracefully moulded form of 
the other, are equally well adapted to it. But^ were the cup and 
the goblet of the same material, there can be little doubt that the 
latter would command the market, because it pleased the eye. 
The sense which makes each sex prefer the beautiful of the other 
needs but little cultivation to become applicable to all objects of 
art ; and art must cater for it more and more, in proportion, as it 
becomes refined and exacting. We all remember that, a few 
years since, a ten-plate stove was a collection of plain iron slabs, 
boxed up into a convenient receptacle for fire and fuel^ with the 
appliances of an oven within it; and even now there are aged 
housewives, who, behind the age, mourn over the old ten-plate 
stove, which is to be found red hot in bar rooms of wayside ta- 
verns, in secluded districts, on wintry days, or whose members 
may be traced in fire hearths, or in the steps at door ways, in 
rural regions, whose dwellings are of a by-gone time. But now, 
who sees the ten plate stove of other days, with its inscription of 
some forgotten furnace? In its place therehave sprung up a host 
of stoves, in which the rich forms of the ornate style of decoration 
of Louis XIV, the bold and graceful outlines of gothic architec- 
ture, the quaint fancies of the Elizabethan age, are imitated in 
the iron with a beauty and skill which, thirty years ago, would 
have made a single stove, without a fellow^ a present for a king. 
Now, whence has come this change ? It is the result of a compe- 
tition among the manufacturers to meet the demands of the 
public taste — a competition wdiich, as we have already said, cre- 
ates the taste which the article produced gratifies, im[)roves, and 
makes more exacting still. But the change in the form of the 
ten-plate stove works other changes that are not seen in the ar- 
ticle itself. To cast, clean and sharp, the designs we have re- 
ferred to, the rough old processes of the foundry are incompetent. 
To make the pattern, which, when moulded in the sand, scives 
to receive the melted iron, the conunon carpenter is no longer 
sufficient. Traditionary forms have ceased to be available; a 
great change in many tilings has to be wrought before the stoves 
in question, which throng (he paviMuenls in liight street, can bo 
produced. The artist nuist bo employed, wilh his crayons and 
colors, far away from the foundry, in his quiet study, with rare 



12 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

and cosily books about him, containing the representation of all 
that is beautiful in decorative art in other lands: with statues, casts 
and models all around ; with his walls hung with paintings; and 
on the table before him, the spotless sheet that is to receive the 
impress of his genius, as he turns the old ten plate stove into a 
thing of grace and elegance. Thus prepared, the artist begins 
his work. His hand has never touched the moulding sand or 
held the ladle, whose bright and sparkling charge of liquid inetal 
is to flow, that the forms he traces on the fragile paper may be 
perpetuated by other hands in iron. But the founder is depend- 
ent upon him — he must toil before the iron can be poured ; be- 
cause there is a public taste ever refining, ever exacting, which 
requires that there should be an union of intellect and labor even 
for the simple purpose we are describing. There is no reason 
why the founder should not be his own artist — why he should 
not find around his cupola the information, the taste, that he re- 
quires. In time this will come to pass. When Penny Maga- 
zines; Knowledge for the MiUion, Science in Sport, Philosophy 
Made Easy, Peter Parley in his line, and institutions like our 
own, shall have accomplished their purposes, this will be so. 
But, in the meanwhile, the union of intellect and labor must be 
found in the joint exertions of different individuals; and hence it 
is, that in our history of the tan-plate stove^ we have begun in the 
studio of an artist Nor are we without our warrant for so doing. 
In 1835; a single firm of stove manufacturers, of Sheffield, Eng- 
land, paid $7,500 for designs alone of stoves, grates and fenders. 
After the artist comes the modeler, should the design require 
it; and the art of the modeler is part of that of the statuary — and 
the leaves, or arabesque, or mouldings are formed in clay or wax, 
until the drawing is executed in the form which the iron is to 
assume. Working with the moulder, perhaps the moulder him- 
self, is the pattern maker, no longer a rough planer of boards, but 
an artizan of finished skill in working in wood, who completes 
the pattern from which the casting is to be made. Give to the 
pattern maker the advantages which are becoming more accessi- 
ble to him every day, and he \viU take the artist's place, and 
each form that he creates will be suggestive of another; and with 
crayon and chisel alternating in his hands, with a refined and 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 13 

accomplished taste and creative fancy, united with consummate 
mechanical skill, he will be the impersonation of the idea we 
have here endeavored to elaborate. Benvenuto Cellini was a 
soldier, an author and a silversmith. The day of such men may 
arrive again. At length the model reaches the foundery, and the 
mould is to be made from itj not as in the olden day, when the 
castinof came from the flask with a thick coat of sand, which had 
to be scraped and picked away before there was a saleable result. 
The mould is to be made so that the casting shall be as smooth 
as those specimens of Berlin iron which ladies wear in necklaces 
and ear-rings. Instead of moulding a plain surface, the moulder 
has now to form in the sand all that the artist has traced in his 
studio. His eye must be accurate, his touch as light as a fea- 
ther and yet as steady as a rock. Cool and deliberate, exercis- 
ing judgment at every turn, the moulder, kneeling on the floor, 
with his trowel, and rammer, and hooks beside him, with the 
smoky roof above him, obtaining light as he may through win- 
dow's blackened with soot, with the roar of the cupola in his ear, 
the moulder, thus circumstanced, completes bis work, and closes 
the flask, ready for the iron. Upon the accuracy of his work de- 
pends the entire result. The artist must design in reference to 
what the moulder can do; and the increasing beauty which we 
daily see in ornamental castings is evidence of increasing skill 
and intelligence on the part of the latter. Were the moulder able 
to design, nothing would be designed that could not be executed; 
execution would suggest designs, and skill and intellect would 
be united in this part of the operation. At last the gate of the 
cupola is opened, and the stream of melted iron pours into tiie 
ladle, and, amid the dust and noise, the hurry and confusion, 
rough dark men, with faces averted from the flaming stream, re- 
ceive the melled metal as it runs, and, transferring it to the 
moulder's flask, fill form after form prepared for it in (he sand, 
and, amid a thousand sparkling stars, give to the conception of 
the artist's brain a permanent and useful form. Here ends the 
picturesque of the history of the successor of the ten-plate stove : 
Crowded on curb stones, rattling on drays, piled in warehouses, 
blackened with grease, banged wiih tongs, aye, spit upon and 
abused, it fills its base uses, until, burnt out, it is broken up into 



14 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

old metal) to rind its way back into the cupola^ to make its reappear- 
ance in some form of more perfect beauty even than that whose 
creation we have described^ the result of a still closer union of 
intellect and labor. 

We have illustrated our view by referring to a familiar case. 
But the scope of our remarks includes all subjects of mechanical 
skill. To apply them further would weary your patience and 
add nothing to the argument. 

But the influence of the stove is of sufl^cient importance to 
justify our further use of it by way of illustration. As an object 
of daily use, the beauty of its forms imparts a silent lesson to the 
eye and helps to educate it for important ends. We have seen 
many a gothic design in a stove which the carpenter or architect 
who owned it might imitate with advantage in the exercise of his 
-calling. We have seen arabesque that might be painted on ban- 
ners, and ornaments of the Elizabethan period which cabinet- 
makers might trust with far more confidence than the suggestions 
of their own imaginations. 

The same may be said of numberless products of mechanical 
skill. Indeed we know not one in which propriety of form and 
beauty of design may not be advantageously consulted — from the 
framing of the massive steam engine, which in the English 
steamers seems to perform its wondrous work among Gothic 
aisles, down to a lady's scissors, in the adornment of which art- 
ists in the old world have drawn upon the fanciful and pic- 
turesque. 

The importance of the application of the fine to the mechanic 
arts is well understood abroad, and the wonder is that, even up to 
the present time, it is so little appreciated in this country. In 
1835 it was made the subject of investigation before a committee 
of the British House of Commons, when the most intelligent 
witnesses were examined under oath. The result was the es- 
tabhshment in that country of the Government schools of design 
for gratuitous instruction. One of the witnesses says: '^That he 
also found those workmen who could draw, if ever so little, more 
useful than those who were totally unable to employ a pencil." 
Another witness, an eminent silk manufacturer, stated ^'He would 
willingly engage a man, at a handsome salary, conversant with 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE . 15 

the principle of drawing, as a designer, and also to put the pat- 
tern upon paper. " Another witness speaks of '^a gentleman em- 
ployed to design for a celebrated firm of jewellers, which paid 
him a salary of $2,500 per annum and supplied him with a house 
to live in, besides allowing him to dedicate a portion of his time 
to his art for his own interest." At Bruges, in Belgium, six or 
seven hundred young men, belonging to the poorer classes, are 
educated gratuitously, every evening in the week, in drawing and 
in the arts generally, and, once a year, prizes are given to the 
more deserving pupils in each department ; an honor which is 
rendered more flattering by a pubhc procession through the town 
on the prize day. At Antwerp, the Sunday schools are attended 
by about seven thousand children, who are not only instructed in 
reading and writing, but also in drawing; and if any of them 
■evince a natural taste for the latter pursuit, their talents are im- 
mediately cultivated and are afterwards profitably directed in sus- 
taining the reputation of the domestic manufactures. And the 
encouragement does not stop here, for, if more than ordinary 
genius is evinced by any pupil, the opportunity is afforded, at the 
public expense, of pursuing a course of study calculated to en- 
large and mature it. Thus fostered, talent, in Antwerp, has 
emerged into eminence from the poorest ranks of the people. In 
the course of the examination above mentioned, the fact was 
stated that there was at that time a school in Paris, where about 
seventy pupils were instructed expressly in the art of designing 
shawl patterns, by a person who had written a pamphlet on the 
subject. We say as much as we have done, and adduce the 
authorities here quoted, because while there is a general readiness 
to admit the importance of the arts of design in connection with 
the mechanic arts and manufactures, we see but little attention 
paid, in point of fact, to this branch of a useful education ; and 
because we believe that it is a part of the plan of the Maryland 
Institute to remedy, to the extent of its ability, the deficiency 
heretofore existing in this respect. But, surely, it must be appa- 
rent to every one that the use of the pencil nuist be of advantage, 
not only to the mechanics and manufactures, but to all classes in 
society; and while it may be readily admitted, that but few arc 
gifted with talents to make them eminent as artists, yet it may be 



16 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

safely said that there is no one who can learn to write who may 
not at the same time be laught to draw, well enough at least to 
enable him to express his ideas in this manner upon paper. We 
like to see a man feel for his pencil to eke out his speech by a 
sketch on a letter back— or whip out his chalk and draw on the 
nearest board — or make lines and circles in the dust on the floor 
of his forge — or go to work with the end of his cane on the pave- 
ment even — or spill his tea or his wine on the table and with the 
point of his finger, place armies in array, or build houses, or ex- 
plain machinery on the mahogany. Such a man may not be 
more honest than his neighbor, but ten to one he will be more 
efficient to produce results, and get faster on, than he who with 
equal natural ability accomplishes the same purpose of descrip- 
tion by a multiplicity of words. 

Let instruction in drawing, therefore, be as common as instruct 
tion in writing. Let the hand be taught the forms of grace 
and truth as well as pot hooks and hangers, and the pupil 
will not only become a better mechanic, but he will grow up 
to be a better man. If he learns to appreciate the beautiful 
on paper, he will soon find himself looking for the beautiful 
in nature, until he shall admit, that the art which has procured 
him a better market for his labor, has, at the same time, made 
the earth and sky — forest, mountain and river, mid-day and sun- 
set — more glorious in his eyes. Nor is it to the artizan alone that 
these remarks are addressed — they are equally apphcable to all, 
and it is through the agency of institutions like the present that 
we must hope to see them made practically useful. 

The result will be an elevation of the public taste, which is, in 
itself, a purification of the public mind. Let the commonest 
utensils of the poorest household have forms of beauty- Let the 
earthen mug be as graceful in its outline as the Portland vase, and 
have all other things to match, and in a little while a taste will grow 
up which will not be satisfied with merely living, but which will, 
in its turn, beget a pride, that, with the narrowest means, may 
still be gratified by cleanliness and order. The order of the house 
will beget order in its owner. Thrift follows cleanliness. Wants 
are created which it requires economy to gratify; unseemly asso- 
ciations are avoided; education is looked upon with favor; chil- 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 17 

xiren are deemed worthy of being cared for, and in fine an up- 
ward tendency is given to every thougfit, having the happiest 
results here, and leading, step by step, to the best hopes here- 
after. 

No originality is <:laimed for what is here said. All that we 
can do is to put into our own language what is universally ad- 
mitted to be true, in the hope that the ideas expressed may be 
further and more carefully developed. In Europe artizans live 
together in large houses, containing many families, a common 
•staircase, filthy as may be, for no one cleans what is common 
property, and which it is every body^s business to clean — a com- 
mon staircase is the common scene of quarrel — cleanliness is dif- 
ficult, quiet is out of the question, character is brought to a sort of 
average under the common roof — the children fight^ the parents 
take their parts, and not unfrequently one general uproar shivltes 
the edifice from top to bottom. Improvement in morals or in 
manners is next to impracticable under such circumstances, and 
men and women live and die unimproved and unin)provable. 

In this country, all is diflferent, and especially m our city, 
where the comfort and neatness of the habitations of the me- 
chanics is one our distinguishing characteristics; and were we 
called upon to point out in Baltimore some one thing more 
honorable than another, more indicative of sound and healthy 
character among our people, of greater promise for their public 
and lasting prosperity — instead of pointing to our railroads, our 
public buildings, our monuments, or the stately mansions of the 
wealthy — we would point to the long rows of narrow fronted 
houses extending around the city in all directions, with their 
pressed brick fronts, neatly grated attics, their polished window- 
panes and snow v^hite sills and steps, and say: Here are the 
dwellings of the mechanics. Here industry lives in honest pride. 
The wives of these households cannot help being the mothers of 
the orderly and intelligent. The fathers of these households 
have a stake in the community — have a sturdy self-respect, r 
frank independence —the best guarantees of good men and 
order, which never can obtain, where men are stable' 
in stalls, under one common roof, and in one 
-Upon a population like ours, then, the hc*^' 
2 ' \ 



18 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

institutions like the present have a field for the happiest action. 
It will be our own fault if it is not cultivated; and in determining 
to lend our aid in this behalf; we are but acting under the in- 
fluence of the spirit which pervades the age, and Which uniting 
labor and intellect by the diffusion of knowledge among men, 
must enlarge, in its noblest sense, the area of freedom, and secure, 
as far as earth permits it, the happiness of our race. 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 19 



OPENING ADDRESS 

Delivered before thk Maryland Institute for the Pro- 
motion OF THE Mechanic Arts, at its Second Annual 
Exhibition, October, 1849, 

BY WM. PRESCOTT SMITH, ESQ., 

A MEMBER OF THE INSTITUTE. 



Gentlemen : — Hovv difficult is the task that I have undertaken! 
Unskilled in rhetoric, unused to public speaking, with no quali- 
fication, except that of being a practical mechanic, I have con- 
sented, a mere youth, in the presence of gentlemen of judgment, 
of mature age, and of experience, to compress a theme that might 
fill volumes, into the compass of fifteen minutes! And under 
what unfavorable circumstances, too, have I entered upon this 
task ! 

In the midst of all these beautiful testimonials of the ingenuity 
and industry of the country, scattered around in lavish profusion 
— living witnesses of my inability to describe them — urn I called 
on to address a few words to you on this interesting occasion. 

The growth of the mechanic arts may be spoken of in this 
country with peculiar pride and pleasure. It is difficult, at any 
time, to find those who have grown grey in years and fixed in 
habits to concede much to the progress of youth, or to believe 
that great good can spring from any innovations upon their life- 
long usages. It is not strange, therefore, that the Old World 
should, for many years, have been unwilling to acknowl- 
edge the progress and invention of the people of this country. 
The practical life of the great Franklin, the mighty inventions of 
Fulton, the labor-saving machines of Whitney, were all insuf- 
ficient to satisfy incredulous Europeans, that mechanical inge- 
nuity had found its peculiar liome in the United States of Ame- 
rica. It was left for the present generation to make them yield 



20 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

their unwilling assent to the truth that in (he Arts we stand be- 
fore the world as the most fertile and inventive people that now 
exist. Nor, I venture humbly to predict, will it be long before 
such men as Greenoughand Powers in sculpture, Weir and Sully 
in painting, teach them that in the fine arts we are not destined 
to remain far behind the chisel of Canova, or the brush of Mu- 
rillo. Much of the history of the future in this respect will de- 
pend, gentlemen, on such institutions as the one I have the 
honor of addressing. 

Already have they, with electric energy, brought out much of 
the inventive genius of the country. Secure in having the re- 
sult of their daily toils and nightly dreams fairly exhibited to the 
gaze of their admiring countrymen, and conscious, from the past, 
that their efforts will be impartially judged and properly rewarded, 
our countrymen will not be discouraged by frequent failures or 
rendered heartsick by unjust disappointments. Like the honors 
of the Olympic games, at which to win a simple garland of wild 
olive leaves was sufficient to attract the noblest of Greece, and to 
confer honor on the city of the successful champion's birth, — the 
medals and certificates that you confer, valueless in themselves, 
will be sufficient to excite the emulation of the most gifted, and 
to gratify the pride, the honorable pride, of the most ingenious. 

The crowded state of this room, and the extensive display of 
machinery in the hall below, bear testimony to the eagerness 
with which the mechanics and artists of our city and country 
press forward to contend for the prizes offered them. 

The array of beautiful and valuable machinery below, is suf- 
ficient of itself, to establish the truth of what I have advanced 
regarding the rare merit of our people in the mechanic arts. 

There may we see in the busy tide of practical operation a variety 
of complete machines, with their countless springs, levers, wheels, 
and weights, pulleys and pistons, shuttles and stops, cylinders 
and cranks, all unerringly performing the multifarious functions 
assigned them by the genius of their originators. There may we 
see the embodied result of years of anxious toil and patient effort. 
There may we see many of those wondrous evidences of inge- 
nuity, that so strikingly attest the power of the American me- 
chanic to overcome the obstacles encountered in attaining the 
highest excellence in his art. 



L 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 21 

The nicety of calculation, the labonousnessand the intricacy of 
design, (hat characterize most of the masterpieces of human skill 
in inventions, are well exemplified in the machines and models 
now under consideration. Let us briefly enumerate a few of 
them. 

The '^ Card Making Machine" is an exceedingly perfect in- 
vention, and though it does not possess the peculiar claim to our 
attention, that invest many of those around it, is deserving of a 
close examination. 

The two machines adjoining, invented by a native and a resi- 
dent of our city, present many novel and remarkable features in 
their organization, that stamp their author as a man of decided 
genius and mechanical skill. These are the ^^Pin Making" and 
the "Pin Sticking" machines, the first of which, a most compact 
arrangement of many separate movements — executes its work of 
transforming the long reels of thin wire with which it is fed, into 
well finished pins; while the other, after they are polished, neatly 
and swiftly fastens them upon the papers in the m.ost exact rows, 
ready for use. 

Although these objects have long since been attained by other 
inventors, they are the first machines for their accomplishment 
that have been publicly exhibited in this country, and were de- 
signed and perfected in Baltimore, wholly without reference to 
those used in the Eastern and Northern Stales. 

Then we have an entirely new machine for the manufacture 
of weavers reeds, which useful implement it produces with great 
rapidity, and of excellent quality. 

The ^'File Cutting Machine" is also an altogether original, as 
well as an ingenious contrivance of much utility — the work of a 
Baltimore mechanic, who died from the efl^ects of his success, upon 
the very day that the value of his invention was established by a 
positive test. 

The two diflTerently constructed machines for the simple but 
useful operation of winding thread, are also among the late im- 
provements of our own city's mechanics. 

In Mr. George Page, a Oaliiniorean, we have a truly prolific 
genius, whose fertile brain has produced a great variety of me- 
cliinery, all having the most practical objects to subserve. Of his 



22 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

inventions, we have at our exhibition but comparatively few 
specimens. The powerful "Circular Saws," the "Cotlon Ma- 
chine," and the ^'Portable Grist Mill," (besides, the '^Portable 
Wind Mill/' which so conspicuously adorns the roofof this build- 
ing,) are among them, all of which are fully equal to the per- 
formance of the objects intended by their inventor — the highest 
praise (hey could receive. 

The factories of Ellicott's Mills and Laurel, in this State, have 
furnished their valuable quota to our display, in the several per- 
fect power looms, and cotiou machines, which combine valuable 
improvements, with workmanshipof the most creditable character. 

Were it not for the fear of taxing your patience, this enumera- 
tion might be extended to an indefinite length, — for we have now 
gathered at this, our second exhibition, a display of original ma- 
chiner}^, rarely excelled on this continent, either for its practical 
utility or for its genuine novelty. To be enabled to offer such a 
varied and so important a combination of machinery, in view of 
the fact, that a similar Institution is now holding its Annual Fair 
in New York, to whose longer established and niore renowned 
custody the industrial products of the whole country are naturally 
attracted; — should be regarded as a source of pride and gratifica- 
tion to the members of the Maryland Institute. 

There is one other work however, to which your attention 
should be directed — a thorough and perfect invention, — in short, 
a monument of rare ingenuity and patient perseverance, that 
entitles the name of a Ballimorean to an honorable rank among 
the inventors of the day. I allude to the '^Netting Machine," 
and its inventor, John McMuUen. 

For years had the untiring exertions of mechanics in this 
country, as well as abroad, failed to complete an instrument that 
would rightly perform the humble task of making a net, one of 
the oldest and most valuable implements that help to supply the 
wants of man. This object was not accomplished until Mr. 
McMuUen, a man born and raised in the field, who resisting the 
natural bent of his mind for mechanics, until he had attained the 
age of forty years, — forsook his plough for the workshop, and, 
after spending some ten years of mental and physical labor amid 
many discouragements, produced the elaborate and perfect ma- 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 23 

chine, now for the first time publicly displayed in practical opera- 
tion. 

Such are some of the attractions that are presented for your con- 
sideration, within the limits of this very building — the products of 
the skill of our own countrymen; indeed, almost of our own citi- 
zens. 

Look at that small machine standing humbly in the corner of 
this room, like the famous dropsical patient of Gerard Douw in the 
Louvre, scarcely noticed amidst the profusion of curiosities around. 
It is that wonderful lightning messenger, (the result too of 
American genius,) that has created a greater revolution than all 
the Crom wells and Napoleons the world ever saw. It has anni- 
hilated space, and bound together the remotest ends of the earth. 
It has conquered Time, and outruns the Sun himself in his course. 
It is richer than the mines of Golconda or of California to the 
merchant; — it is more hostile than a whole host of Fouche's to 
the criminal. And yet it fills but one little corner in this 
repository of inventions. 

Judging from the past, what may not a fertile imagination 
believe of the future. Where shall all this end? What will be 
our condition fifty years hence? 

It requires no prophetic ken to foretell the vast progress that 
will be made in science and her followers, — the useful arts. Two 
centuries have not passed away since the article called Tea was 
unknown in the British Islands, and two pounds of the herb were 
thought a fit present for a King. The progress of the art of navi- 
gation, the perfection of machinery, and the extension of com- 
merce, have made this herb a household word, and have convert- 
ed an utter stranger into an absolute necessity of life. 

Scarcely three centuries have elapsed since Q,ueen Elizabeth 
boasted of the receipt of a pair of sil'k stockings, which she re- 
garded as one of the most valuable curiosities and remarkable 
productions of the age: now, scarce a man so poor amongst us, 
that he cannot clothe his wife in silk from head to foot. 

Fifty years hence, and almost every occupation that now 
engages the hands of man, will be performed by machinery. 
The richest njaterials and the choicest fabrics of the present day 
•will fall far behind the wonders that inventions in machinery 



2i ADRRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

will produce for our children's children, — and new luxuries now 
not dreamed of, must supply the ever increasing wauls of the 
rich and the idle. 

The manifold uses to which that simple and cheap substance 
Caoutchouc has been applied within the last few years, will have 
yielded to some more wonderful application, — and we shall see 
the very stubble of the field, magically converted by chemical 
combination and mechanical contrivances, into some rich vest- 
ment, to adorn the then aristocrats of the land. Railroads will 
then occupy the place that stages now do^ and some improved 
invention will transport us, by the turning of a peg, like the 
ancient Bucephalus, to any distance in a moment of time. The 
wonders that will start up on every side will astonish, with still 
greater astonishment, some future Rip Yan Winkle or Aminadah 
Slocum. 

But amid all these wonders, what v/ill be the condition of th& 
great mass of the people? Will they be benefited by the rapidity 
of the invention,, and the fertility of the resources of the then age, 
or will this expansion of mechanical application tend towards the 
greater degradation and hardships of the poor? 

This is a question of great momertt, gentlemen,, arid one that 
must give us pause. It is a problem, that ought to occupy the 
serious attention of the economists and philanthropists of the day, 
nnd that should enter into your owri thoughts, as members of thi& 
association, and as members of society; — but it is a question of 
too great moment, and of too extensive a character to engage our 
attention at present, especially when I am admonished that i 
have already exhausted your patienx:e, and the time allotted to me. 

Gentlemen, you have undertaken a great and important duty: 
you have united yourselves together for the purpose of fostering 
the mechanical talent of the country,, and of aiding in extending 
the knowledge and benefit of improvements, and of rewarding the 
anxious toil of years with your approbation. But remember, gen- 
tlemen, that this is no slight duty you have imposed on yourselves^ 
and, that neglect on your part faithfully to go on with and carry 
out the design of the Institution, will do more injury to the cause of 
mechanical improvement, than if you had never began thi& enter- 
prise. 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 25 

Weary not, then, gentlemen of the Institute in well-doing, but 
exert yourselves in every way, not only at the period of the ex- 
hibitions, but at all limes, and in every proper season, to advance 
the interest ofthe arts; — to advance the interest of (he mechanics;— 
to advance the interest of yourselves, and consequently improve 
the condition of society. 



26 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 



AN ADDRESS 

Delivered at the close of the Mechanics' Institute, 
ON the evening of the 17th of October; 1849, 
BY JOSHUA VANSANT, ESQ. 

PRESIDENT OF THE INSTITUTE. 



Ladies and Gentlemen : — The time fixed for the close of 
the exhibition having arrived, in fulfilment of the purpose of the 
Institute, it has now become my pleasing duty, as its President, 
to announce to this audience, to whom and for what specimens 
of art and mechanical skill, premiums have been awarded by those 
to whom has been confided that delicate task. 

Before, however, proceeding to do this, the occasion, it is be- 
lieved, may be not unappropriated availed of to indulge in a few 
observations suggested by what we all have seen during our ex- 
hibition, and the substantial ends to which the proper encourage- 
ment of the Mechanic Arts certainly tends. 

It is a fact prominent in the history of civilization, that its pro- 
gress has ever been that of the Arts. The revelations of antiquity, 
and the disclosures of more modern times, establish, beyond all 
doubt, that just in proportion as the Arts have been cultivated by 
a people, have they exhibited wisdom in their legislation, and 
intellectual elevation above their neighbors. The remains of the 
literature of Egypt, Greece, and Ancient Rome, do not more 
clearly point out to us their great superiority to contemporary 
Nations, than do the memorials time has left us of their wonderful 
proficiency in the laws of Physics and the Mechanic Arts. 
Everywhere throughout the immense domain which at different 
periods felt the full force of the vivifying influence of the encour- 
agement extended to the Sciences and Arts, are discoverable, 
irrefragible evidence, that in all that constitutes the happiness, in- 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE- 27 

tellectual vigor and social comfort of a people, they were far in 
advance of the rest of their race ; and (heir iiistories are equally ex- 
plicit in the utterance of the solemn triitli, that just in proportion 
as the study of the Sciences and the cultivation of the Aris were 
neglected, or regarded as but of secondary importance^ was accele- 
rated their decline from all that was great and ennobling in the 
character of the Nation. 

Their histories tell us^ also, that the same race, being in the 
same climate^ may, by one course of training become the cynosure 
to the rest of the world, in science, literature and the arts, whilst 
by a different teaching they may lapse into a condition but little 
better than barbarism. 

It is the part of a practical wisdom to glean from this import- 
ant fact the stern compulsion of avoiding an indifference which 
has humbled and degraded others, and, also, to gather from it the 
necessity of imitating examples which led, under different auspices, 
the same people to the attainment of all that could dignify and 
enlighten them; and, accordingly, in obedience to the cogency of 
the injunction, have the civilized nations of Europe, everywhere, 
extended to science, the fine arts, and to the mechanic arts as dis- 
tinguished from them, not only the encouragement of government, 
but of an enlightened public opinion. 

Within the last three hundred years it has been the aim of 
governments to occupy, principally, the human mind in the con- 
templation of things eminently practical, leaving to the schoolman, 
the consideration of mere abstract theories. The consequence 
has been, that the comforts of mankind within that time have in- 
creased more than a thousand fold, it being now in the power of 
the husbandman, or the artizan, to enjoy, at the domestic tire- 
side, conveniences and comforts which all the wealth and power 
of the mightiest monarchs were inadequate to command a few 
centuries ago. 

There is not a nation in ]^]uropc of power in the settlement of 
National disputes, or in the domain of civilization, that docs not 
with a just pride rank among her statistics of wealth and power, 
and appeal to as one of the surest props of her independence, the 
number and [)roficiency of those who labor in the difrerent branches 
presided over by the science of mechanics. The respect which 



^'^ ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

is everywhere by enlightened minds cheerfully awarded to me- 

Z7onil".T7 ^T'"'"'' ^'■S'^'fi-""^ -^"-gh, the conscious. 
ne,s of the benefits ,t bestows, and induces an intelligent curiosity 
m regard to all projects professing for their aim the- increase of 
comfort, and the annihilation of time in its acquisition. The 
uninformed can only judge of the utility of any thing by its prac 
■ca operations and even they are not always sufficient to unfold 
the mmds of those who cannot, or to those who will not thinlc 
^le full extent of the benefits to flow from any combinalion o 
mechanical powers. To such, however, the only school that can 
be furm.hed is that of experience, or such exhibitions as ours- 
hey can only be taught through .he sense of sishl; but bein^ so' 
aught mclinalion for one's own gain, or ease, not unfrequen.ly 
tempts them ,o reward in the way of patronage, the toils and pain- 
ful thoughts of the machinist, and thus by encouragement, open 
a wider domam for the exercise of mechanical skill and usefulness 
Aware of this, with praisewonhy zeal, in nearly all the countries 
of l^.urope, the powerful and learned have established and sus- 
tained academies and institutes, in which are not only exhibited 
the products of mechanical ingenuity, but in which are taught, 
by masters of science, the forces and the applicalions of the me- 
chanical powers. In humble imitation, but with the same noble 
purpose in view, has the Mechanic's Institute been organized- iu 
success in the accomplishment of its object, must, in "a great de- 
gree, depend on the public's sense of its usefulness. lis claims 
on an enlightened support, may, to some extent, be found in what 
IS to be seen around us, for here, in a thousand instances, have 
we physical evidence of ihe true definition of the Aris—t/ie dis- 
posilio7i or modification of things by human skill to answer the 
purpose intended And although our collection is not so exten- 
sive as we indulge the hope it will be at subsequent exhibitions, 
yet there is to be seen in the different models and machines, com- 
binations evidencing no trifling knowledge of the principles of 
Pneumatics, Optics, Cliemislry, Hydraulics and Architecture. 

The ready genius of our countrymen availing itself of the dis- 
coveries of Europe, has, with an uncommon rapidity and proliflc- 
ness, added much to the domain of the Arts. When we consider 
the character of our institutions, and the general diffusion of the 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 29 

elementary principles of science among the young, we readily 
perceive why it is that our advance has been so rapid. P^ree in- 
stitutions which give to each citizen an individuality, necessarily, 
and as a consequence, excite in all, possessing ordinary pride of 
character, the desire to do something which, while it commands 
commendation, promises independence. In a young and exten- 
sive country, diversified in its topography and productions, as is 
ours, the demand for mechanical and scientific skill is much 
greater than in one not exhibiting the various national features 
which make ours emphatically great and wonderful in its devel- 
opments. The extent and elevation of our mountains, the length 
and depth of our rivers, the riches and variety of our mines, put 
in requisition all that is or may be known of science to enable us 
to enjoy in their full, the mighty advantages these national boun- 
ties put within our reach To subjugate these great means to the 
purposes of our comforts and advancement, enterprise for many 
years has been most actively employed, and as auxiliary to it, the 
inventive mind of the country has engaged itself in a thousand 
channels, producing in each, and all, something subserving the 
great purposes of trade, manufacture and bodily ease. Of what 
use would be the immense deposits of coal and of iron and other 
metals, if our mechanical knowledge was inadequate to raise ihem 
from the mine, or fashion them into forms useful for civilized 
life? Or w^hat use would be the mighty streams which traverse 
our republic, if we were ignorant of nautical architecture, and tlie 
properties of the elastic fluids, air and steam? Without such 
knowledge, instead of furnishing the elements of wealth and 
power, and fields for an honorable industry, they would be bar- 
riers to progress and indications of our feebleness. But when sub- 
servient to the combinations of the five m.echanical powers, they 
constitute the sources from which flows not only the livelihood of 
millions, but our perfect independence of the rest of the world. 

In such a country, then, a thorough knowledge of the laws of 
mechanics is indispensable to its vigorous growth, and the devel- 
opment of its wealth. Not only are its mineral deposits valueless 
without the aid of mechanism, but agriculture itself is degraded 
into the tedious unproductiveness which characterizcil it during 
the dominion of the untutored Indian. But when aided b}' the 



1 



30 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

skill and invention of the mechanic, the bowels and surface of the 
earth plentifully yield all that is required to constitute us a pow- 
erful and great people. 

It is to be feared that the great dignity which, when properly 
considered, belongs to the inechanic arts, is not fully compre- 
hended as it should be by all who recognize themselves as among 
those who cultivate some of them. It unfortunately has been too 
much the case for young men to think their education in a particu- 
lar art completed when they can execute their allotted task so as 
not to incur the displeasure of their employer. This is a sad 
mistake. In whatever branch of mechanics we may be employed, 
we should feel it our duty to look beyond it, and discover, if possible, 
its connection with and dependence on others which we do not 
pursue for a livelihood. By so doing, our useful knowledge will 
be enlarged, and an increased facility in the execution of our 
work acquired. We should endeavor to learn the place and the 
manner in which the tools wuth which we work are made — and 
above all, the reason why they have one form rather than another. 
Such knowledge gives food for thought, and awakens the mind to 
the importance of the inquiry w^hether improvements could not 
be made. If the tradesmen but execute his task without inquiry 
as to the reason why it assumes its particular form, he in fact is 
but little more intelligent in its execution, than the machine or 
tools by which he is assisted. The mason who contents himself 
with his ability to place a stone in a particular place, and to attach 
others to it by means of a cement, the properties of which he is 
ignorant, knows but little of the pursuits on which he bestows his 
time and labor. It was not so with those great ancients whose 
monuments of art are the wonder of the world. The mason who 
laid the foundation of the pyramids in sand-stone, was taught by 
his knowledge of chemistry, that the acids of the particular earth 
would in time undermine the mighty fabric, if it rested on a 
material like itself; and from the same source the builder of the 
temple at Ephesus learned the necessity of charring the timbers 
destined to support the superstructure. Had they, like some of 
our day, satisfied themselves with the mere placing of stone and 
timber in the ground, their work would not as now, attest their 
knowledge of something more than mere labor. There are 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 31. 

ihousands, who, devoid of a proper ambition^ daily attend on cot- 
ton spinning machines without allowing themselves to think why 
it is that it is capable of achieving its results. They will not give 
themselves the trouble to trace out how a central power with 
axles^ wheels, levers, screws, straps, (fee, can be so combined; 
and yet, there have been those who perceived in these the princi- 
ples of motion, and have been able to apply them to the ad- 
measurement of time, the purposes of locomotion, and even to 
that of pleasure and the gratification of curiosity. Vancausan by 
making himself familiar with mechanic powers, made an artificial 
duck, which performed every function of a real one, even an 
imperfect digestion, eating, drinking, and quacking; and Camus, 
when Louis the XIV was a small boy, made for him a coach and 
two horses, with coachman and footman, the horses and figures 
moving naturally, variously and perfectly. I mention these 
singular productions to show, that the same principles which we 
see at work in a familiar piece of machinery, are capable, under 
different arrangement and application, of the most astonishing 
results; and from the fact I wish to urge the necessity and im- 
portance of my fellow mechanics, in whatever art they may be 
engaged, to learn if possible something of the nature of all the 
mechanic powers, and of the kindred sciences. Perhaps I could 
not illustrate this necessity more pointedly or strikingly, than by 
referring to the trade of a wheelright. To such of them as never 
gave themselves the trouble to ascertain the effect of the globular 
form of the earth on all moving bodies, the assertion that one 
could move on wheels up a hill, the axles moving at the same 
time, and in the same direction, would have been regarded as 
the strongest evidence of ignorance of the motion of carts and 
common carriages ; and yet, had such known the true principles 
of motion, they would have seen as they do now in the case of 
the railroad car, that such a feat is practicable ; that by means of 
the friction of the earth elevations can be overcome. 

That every incentive to the cultivation of the arts may be 
afforded, is one of the prominent reasons for the establishment of 
the Institute; and another is to be found in the fact, that all ex- 
perience establishes that emulation and genius are excited by 
exhibitions of skill, inducing all who participate to the most ac- 



I 



32 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

live employment of whatever of talent or knowledge (hey possess; 
and thus, by engaging niind and labor, it is to work out results 
gratifying and honorable to oar State. 

The benefit of such continued action is manifest where it has 
been tested. The fine arts are indebted for many a votary to the 
assemblage in one place of the works of an Angela^ a Guido, a 
Rubc?is^a Lecnardo di Vinci; and the English artist, at this day, 
finds witliin the walisoftheRoyal Academy, opportunities not only 
to study in the Italian school, but to examine the beauties of Ho- 
garth, Lawrence, Reynolds, and Gainsborough. So too at Paris, 
Brussels, Berlin, London, Liverpool, Edinburgh, Birmingham and 
Leeds, are established Institutes in which is considered and ex- 
plained all that is known or believed in reference to the discoveries 
in the sciences and the arts, employing the latter term in its broadest 
sense. Such an institution in our midst, is thought to be a de- 
sideratum; to permanently found it, is our aim. Its purposes 
look all to the public good. It proposes the full exercise of our 
mechanical skill and ingenuity, and the application of them to 
purposes of practical utility. If the active intellect and experience 
of our Stale will but join in the exertion essential to its mainte- 
nance, the community as well as ourselves will be more than 
repaid by its gratifying results. 

In such a presence as this, the mere statement of the objects of 
our institution is all that is necessary to insure for it respect, and 
the best wishes for its success. The past history of our city, it is 
fondly believed, also authorizes the hope that its citizens will ex- 
tend to our eflforts their approving support, and thereby encourage 
us to continued exertion. The number who have visited our 
exhibition is an ample guarantee of the extent and depth of the 
interest which this community feels in the fruition of our hopes; 
and, from it, we will derive additional incentives to the prosecu- 
tion of the great task we have allotted to ourselves, confident in 
the belief that each year will enable us to exhibit to our fellow- 
citizens something new and useful, and, by so doing, entitle our- 
selves to rank with our countrymen of the North, in all that so 
emphatically designates them as a people eminent in all that per- 
tains to mechanical invention. Animated with this assurance, 
the members of the Institute will withhold no exertion essential 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE, 33 

to justify the favor which their fellow-citizens have already be- 
stowed on them, and which they desire to engage in the future. 

The most agreeable part of my duty is yet unperformed. It is 
in obedience to the instruction of the Maryland Institute that I 
thank those who have contributed in the exhibition of articles. 
About us are to be seen specimens of their ingenuity, skill and 
industry. Pennsylvania, Delaware, New York, and Ohio, 
have contributed much that is useful and beautiful , evincing the 
inventiveness, industry, and public spirit of their citizens. New- 
England — where useful industry has surmounted every barrier to 
greatness, and made her land from Connecticut to Maine a con- 
tinual work-shop from whence emanate products that invest every 
mart : where industry is merit and inactivity vice — has furnished 
her specimens. To the citizens of our own State we are mainly 
indebted for the success of our enterprize, The inventiveness of 
their genius and the workmanship of their hands, evidence that 
Maryland will take her rank in the useful arts with her sister 
States, north of her boundary. The handiwork of woman adorns 
the walls and the tables of this hall. These productions of her 
industry furnish the surest guaranty that the arts can never be- 
come degraded whilst her example lends its predominating in- 
fluence. Wherever she directs her energies — and they are never 
diverted into a wrong channel — success must follow ; and whilst 
we thank the ladies for their efforts on this occasion, we invite 
their continued co-operation for the advancement of the mechanic 
arts and the kindred sciences. 

In conclusion, and as the organ of (he Institute, I am charged 
with the duty of thanking this audience and the citizens of Bal- 
timore, and of the State, whose presence has manifested the in- 
terest felt for the success of the Institute, a duty which is cheer- 
fully performed ; for among those around me is not only to be 
recognized the skilful artist and the ingenious machinist, but 
lovely woman, whose approving smile is the test of merit and the 
incentive to honorable exertion. In the name, therefore, of the 
members of this Institute, I present to this good company their 
sincere acknowledgments for its kind appreciation of the efforts 
which have been made to present to it, and the rest of our fellow 
•citizens, something worthy of their consideration and interest. 
3 



34 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 



ADDRESS 

Delivered at the opexixg of the Exhibition of Ameri- 
can .Maxufactures, held at Washixgtox Hall, by the 
Marylaxd Institute for the Promotion' of the Me- 
CHAXic Arts, Baltimore. October, 15. ISoO, 
BY CA-MPBKLL MORFIT, ESQ. 

OF PHILADELPHIA. 



We are here, to celebrate the anniversary of an Institute for 
the Proniotion of the Mechanic Aits. 

It is not the commemoration of an historic event ; — some baitle, 
where victory perched in honor of the living, while it flapped its 
rejoicing wings to waft the sighs of the dying to their mourning 
friends. But still it is in token of a battle ; one in which genius 
and art liave had their conflicts, in the more grateful space of com- 
mon enterprise ; and their victories, instead of bearing ensanguined 
stains, are heralded with the white and spotless flag of peace. 

The trophies are neither swords nor spears ; not weapons to 
wound, but implements to assist and inventions to nourish man- 
kind ; products from labor brought to encourage others to add to 
the common cause of usefulness. The plan of bringing together, 
for exhibition, the inventions of our fello\v-citizens,, is productive 
of much good in many respects. It enables us to know what ad- 
vances have been made in the different branches of industry. It 
offers to our use the various iinprovements in m.achinery, tools 
and implements. It creates emulation among artisans and men 
of science, spreads new and useful inventions through the coun- 
try, and is the means, in many instances, of rendering labor pro- 
fitable as well as pleasant. 

The cultivation of the field requires smoothing and conveni- 
ences, as does that of the mind ] and the plough of easy draft 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 35 

helps the task of the ploughman as the lexicon does that of the 
scholar. So'too with the mechanic. His mortising, planing, sa;v- 
ing and other machines are so many wooden or metal workmen — 
genius infused into inanimate matter, so as to create laboring 
automata, to save the toil and sinew of the weak, the poor and the 
•infirm. It is -one of the charities of Providence given in a new 
form, so that, without dependence upon others, the wants of our 
hands may receive a sufficient relief from the generous bounty of 
our minds. It is indeed the realization of the fable, that Minerva, 
the Goddess of the Arts, sprang from the brain of Jupiter. 

Genius belongs to no set, degree nor station. It is a free spirit, 
which roves where she wills and lights where she listetb ) and 
therefore it is, that those who are workmen, as well as encouragers 
in her name, have built up an Institute as a resting-place for her 
wings ; so that her votaries may throw off (heir trammels, scruti- 
Tiize the offerings of their fellows, emulate their doings, and catch 
the inspiration that may reveal their own talents. 

All nations, as they advance in civilization, have had these 
<^elebrations. They originated, probably, in a sense of gratitude 
to the Author of Good, who was typified under some mythologic 
form . 

The Greeks had their Olympic games in honor of Jupiter. At 
those games, though they were for gymnastic sporls, many pro- 
ducts from the distaff, tlie field and the loom were sometimes ex- 
hibited ; and though they were dedicated to temples and the gods, 
they served to show the improvements in (he various branches of 
handicraft, as well as to incite and encourage others in similar 
pursuits. 

The Saturnalia of (he Latins was for similar purposes; — the ori- 
gin of it is lost in its antiquity. In some legends, it is ascribed to 
Janus in remembrance of a guest and benefactor. Other histori- 
ans attribute it to an emigrating tribe upon their first sctdement in 
Italy. The festival was in honor of Saturn, to whom the inhab- 
i(ants attributed the introduction of agriculture and the arts of civ- 
ilized life. It began near the close of the year, when (he agricul- 
tural season was over, and it was looked upon as a harvest home; — 
all participated in it, and all was merriment and joy. Many of 
the sports resembled those of our Christmas and the Italian car- 
nivals. 



36 ADRRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

The institution in different periods was either lost or neglected, 
but was always in some age revived ; so that from the days, per- 
haps, of even the Egyptians, celebrations of the present kind 
have existed, and though obscured for awhile, have broken out at 
intervals like a bright sun through the drifting clouds. 

After all, then, perhaps our anniversary is only a revival of 
what has been in all countries and in all ages since civilization 
began; perhaps we are but enacting what was done in Greece 
and in Rome in their early days j or in Egypt, at a still remoter 
time, and the offerings we make, now, to public approbation, are 
like those that were made under different motives to Ceres, Mi- 
nerva, or Osiris. If so, it shows what ought to give a religious 
impulse to this and similar institutions, that its foundation is in 
an all- wise Providence w^hich instills into man good intentions 
and good enterprises under worldly forms; and perpetuates what- 
ever is to be for the general benefit of mankind, by making it a 
part of their instinct to keep it in being. 

Let us, then, go on in this career and look to these Institutions 
as valuable even for us, who seem to have no immediate interest 
in ihem, as laboratories for the improvement of our physical com- 
forts and condition, as the Magi of the East regarded the star of 
Bethlehem, in the moral sense, — a divine light leading to safety. 

The Institution, which now celebrates its anniversary, though 
intended especially for the promotion of the Mechanic Arts, is not 
mecha?iical merely; its operations are also mental. The rules of 
construction, the art of design, and schools of lecture are all made 
assistants to the accomplishment of the desired end. Men may 
not only grow up under its aid as artisans, but as skillful and 
instructed vt'orkmen. 

The term Mechanic is derived from a Greek word, signifying 
a machine; and, perhaps, in early times, the man of handicraft 
was but a dull agent under the direction of some scientific theo- 
rist. It is not now, however, as in less enlightened days, when a 
Mechanic was a mere hewer of w^ood or worker with tools. At 
this time, some scholarship is required, and the older we grow as 
a country, the more do our citizens advance in intellectual culti- 
vation. The school-master is indeed abroad, and every day an 
emulation is produced to profit by his teachings. But learning 



' THE iMARYLAND INSTITUTE. 3t 

does not come from the out door master, it is from the inward 
teacher: self-instruction is the great motor or power that impels 
on and improves the mind. 

The great Ferguson was but a shepherd's boy, who, while he 
watched his flocks at night, contemplated the motions of the 
heavenly bodies, and marked the position of the stars with beads 
and a string. His application made him afterwards a great as- 
tronomer, and it is his writings which we sometimes consult, 
when we wish to learn in clear but simple terms, the harmonious 
motions of those planets which make the music of the spheres. 

Bloomfield was a shoemaker's boy, who taught himself in the 
tedious hours of the night, while he improved the journey men and 
lightened their labors, by reading to them as they worked. His 
poems are beautiful, and his rural descriptions are equal to some 
of the lines of Virgil. 

The inventor of the spinning jenny, by which perpetual em- 
ployment has been given to thousands of families, was a poor 
barber. He became from his usefulness and talents Sir Richard 
Arkwright, and died rich in fame and worldly stores. The am- 
bitious Cicero cried out, ^^Let my name be honored;" but here, 
the modest tradesman excelled the Roman orator, for his works 
were more eloquent than words; — and instead of asking from 
posterity, — he bequeathed to it a benefit as lasting as its wants. 

It were a task of lime to enumerate the number who have 
mounted the highest round on the ladder of a good fame by their 
self-instruction. 

Rittenhouse, of Pennsylvania, was a moderate farmer; he 
studied while at work, and the plough, the fences, and even the 
stones, were marked with the figures of his thoughts. 

His progress in matheiDatics enabled him to master the"Pn?i- 
cipia'^ of Newton. He became a member of the Philosopliical 
Society of Philadelphia, and calculated the transit of Venus. 
This was a new thing in America; it was perhaps, among many, 
Jooked upon as presumptuous, and as if he had, like Joshua, 
commanded: ^'Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon, and thou, 
Moon, in the valley of Ajalon." But it was the inspiration of 
study and genius in the latter, as it was that of Divinity in the 
former. 



38 AI>DRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

What must have been the public expectation, as the time a]T- 
proached in which an American, in the early days of our coun- 
try — even while she was in a colonial state — should have foretold 
die happening of an event in the mystic movements of the heav- 
ens, that only the deeply learned of olden lands had ever ventur- 
ed upon. 

The day— the hour came- numbers were present to witness 
the realization, perhaps the failure of the prophecy. Pride of 
country, fear, expeciation, hope, were all mingled and at their 
highest tension. There was not a cloud in the horizon: the nni- 
nute — the moment came, and in the very instant also came the 
appointed contact of the planet and the sun!! The emotion of 
the philosopher was so great, that he fainted in the excess of 
joy — amid the echoing plaudits of a cheering crowd. 

His example lives in our remembrance, and his epitaph is- 
written and repeated in the admiration of the world. 

Franklin is another name to call forth our emulation and our 
hope J his beginning was very humble and his progress at first but 
slow, yet he became a Philosopher and Statesman, and not leasts 
a Moralist — living like a wise man and dying like a good one — 
leaving 

"His body, 

^'Like the cover of an old book." 

Stripped of its lettering and gilding. 

As ^'food foF worms-" 

BeNeving that ^'the work itself would not be lost," 

But ^^appear once more" 

"In a new" 

And more beautiful edition," 

^^Corrected and amended" 

^'By tbe Author." 

As reorards the mechanic arts, it is difficult to say when thev be- 
gan. Yirgil thinks that all improvements came by slow degrees: 

"Jove willed that man, by lon;^ experience taught, 
Should various arts invent, by gradual thought." 

The palladium, or safety of Troy, was said to have been origi- 
r.ally a small statue of Pallas or Minerva, tlie Goddsss of Wis- 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 39 

dom, holding a distaff and a spindle. It was thought to be a gift 
from the gods, and the contests in those days, between I he Greeks 
and Trojans, for that paHadium, as sang by Homer, were after 
all, perhaps, nothing more than a continued competition, allego- 
rical ly represented in the form of war, for a supremacy in the 
production of the handicrafts of civilization. 

The plough and other implements of husbandry, trade and war 
are mentioned in the earliest days of Scriptural history, and many 
believe that they too, like those of the mythology of the Greeks, 
came from a supernatural source of good. 

The military engines of the ancients, such as the catapultaand 
balistse, which involve the principles of compound machinery, 
were long used before any attempt to explain the simplest princi- 
ples of mechanics. The ancients had, from time immemorial, 
made use of the same niachines for raising and transferring 
weights which are used at the present day. 

The noble temple of Ephesus was built by fixing pivots in the 
ends of the massive stones and then rolling them from the quarry 
to the building. 

Aristotle was the first who studied the theory of mechanics. 
His notions are, however, obscure, and the discovery of what was 
afterwards termed the fundamental principles in mechanics, that 
if two powers move with equal velocity reciprocally proportioned, 
they will exert equal actions, would hardly be considered as a 
great wonder at the present day, when such a result seems to be 
the natural effect of equal action. 

Archimedes, however, has always been considered as the real 
founder of tiie science of mechanics. The properly of the lever 
was fully ascertained by him; the centre of gravity of different 
figures, the theory of the inclined plane, the pulley and the screw 
have been ascribed (o him. 

A great saying has also been attributed to him, that of, — '' Give 
me a fulcrum and I luill move the earUiy This is no doubt a 
romance of history, as the great mechanic in speaking to a great 
monarch, for it is supposed to have been addressed to Hiero, king 
of Syracuse, woidd not have made so vain a request; nor would 
tlic modesty, that always att(Muls a great mind, have permitted 
the manifestation of so much vatiily and egotism. 



40 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

We must, therefore, attribute this exclamation to the fancy of 
the historians, who, sometimes, even in this age of more precision, 
dress up their works in drapery to suit the wonder-loving taste of 
the credulous, rather than truth. At any rate, the account tends 
to show how much the powers of the great mechanic were ap- 
preciated, since he had done wonders by his art in defending bis 
city from the enemy. 

Plutarch tells us, that Archimedes delayed the surrender of 
Syracuse by oppositig new nailitary engines, the invention of his 
genius at the moment, to resist the attacks of Appius and the 
Roman cohorts. 

During the feast of Diana,^ while the sentinels were negligent, 
the enemy entered the city, and though Marcellus had charged 
his troops not to molest the philosopher, he was killed by the 
soldiers while he was absorbed in his studies. Such was the fate 
of a great man, who smoothed the labors of the tradesman by his 
science, and whose genius has descended from age to age, as a 
continuous legacy to help the artisans of all nations, and perhaps 
to all times. 

Numbers of other great men, from the period of Archimedes, 
which was between two and three hundred years before Christ, to 
the present day, and too numerous to name, have followed him 
in the same career; every nation of Europe, as well as of our 
own country, has furnished aids and inventors in the same career^ 
With the exception of what are termed motors or new motive 
powers, such as steam and electricity, and also excepting various 
modern combinations of known principles — the mechanical pow- 
ers are the same as they were in time of Archimedes. They 
are six in number; — the lever, the pulley, the wheel and axle, 
the inclined plane, the wedge and the screw. 

These are the great powers, some of which, from the time of 
the building of Solomon's temple to that of a modern domicil, 
have been used in bringing them to completion. 

It would be a wide field to enter upon, if it were necessary to 
pay a respect to the names of the many who are known in histo- 
ry, as having assisted in the study and application of mechanics 
to improving and facilitating the condition of labor. 

Almost all men of genius, in all generations, have made efforts 
towards keeping up this improvement, and it seems to be a quali- 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 41 

ty of philanthropy coupled with our own self-interest as w^ell as 
ambition, to do something that may help the laboring classes; as 
well as flatter our own vanity in the popularity of the inventions. 
As this is a natural inclination, it may be easily improved by 
making it a moral obligation. 

The first social duty of every man, next to that of advancing 
his own interest, is to do all that he can for the general good; he 
owes it to his fellow men, not only because it is a duty which the 
compact of society inculcates, but because our natural promptings 
tell us it is just. 

Who, that is not a misanthrope, can satisfy himself that he has 
done his duty, when he inwardly feels he has rendered nothing, 
has acquitted himself of nothing save his rigid obligations to the 
laws? 

No one can expect to be held guiltless of a social wrong, who, 
with the gifts of Providence surrounding him in every form, ne- 
glects, if he does not refuse to yield some and do something to 
maintain the stock of bounties from which he has so largely 
drawn. 

The ancients taught this, and a great Athenian philosopher — 
who had given precepts and good examples — thinking he had 
not done enough while living, left, in calmly dying, an offering 
of gratitude to Esculapius. 

It is often the case that the ingenious inventor of some new 
improvement languishes in want, while his discovery is slowly 
finding its way to notice and encouragement ; perhaps its profit- 
ableness does not arrive at maturity even in his lifetime, but has 
to pass gradually through distant generations before it emerges 
into general renown. 

The heart that had confided in the fruilfulness of its talent, had 
hoped on in disappointment, and perhaps had long since passed 
away; but let it not be thought that it lived in vain, for like the 
aloe tree, that blooms once only in a century, its flowers at last 
burst forth, and in the perfection of time, yield a rare and grate- 
ful fragrance. 

These things are in a system of ethics, hidden by a mystical 
Providence. Men live unknown in one generation, whose deeds 
speak out eloquently in others. It is so in all nature. — The bulb- 



A2 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

ous plant of beauty, that has been held in the hand of the 
Eg3'piian mummy for three thousand years — a tribute paid to 
death — is not dead itself, but breaks it cerements, and, through 
the medium of what seems an idle curiosity, is transferred from 
the tombs of Pharaoh to the gardens of a new world, to blossom 
as a modern flower. 

The planets that have been hidden for ages and ages unheard 
of and unknown, at length break upon our sight and add a new 
lustre to the lights of heaven. 

All these are portions of a system made, not for one age, but 
for tlie future; so that the consolation for the present disappoint- 
ment of men is, that their works of good, though not known now, 
will be like the repressed efflorescence of the aloe tree, the 
Egyptian bulb, and the advancing constellations — tributes of 
light to the dark of other times. 

Archimedes, the great mechanic, was long forgotten and many 
of his theories unknown: no one could tell where was even the 
resting place of his ashes; and so it remained for more than one 
hundred years, until Cicero discovered his tomb covered with 
briers and bushes, and gave it in history " a local habitation and 
a name." From that day its position has been known, and his 
levers and pulleys and screws are, as they had been, the engines of 
every industry. 

So it will be with many of the contributors, in the mechanic 
arts, to the annual exhibitions of this and similar Institutes; but 
they are not fruits cast away; if they slumber, they still bear the 
latent spark of vitality, which the thunder of some distant day 
may awaken into animated strength. 

The tomb of some now unnoticed workman may be found by 
some modern Tullius, who will ennoble it by a reference to the 
o-ood w^hich his inventive genius has done for his fellow man. 

All, then, should strive to do something in this common cause; 
and even if he fail to-day — that failure may give new zeal, lead- 
ino" to success to-morrow. 

The mind is like gold which becomes refined by its melting, 
or like the hardened steel, the keener by its hardening; at any 
rate, each should endeavor to leave his foot- prints in the sands of 
time; — 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 43 

"Footprints that, perhaps, another, 

Sailing o'er life's troubled main, 
Some forlorn and shipwreck'd brother 

Seeing, may take heart again." 

Education is the great lever of good, which all may contribute 
to put in operation. The rich can assist out of their abundance — 
and those who cannot give money may furnish aid in other forms. 

It is not a work of charity, but of duly, in which all are con- 
cerned; because all will participate in its consequences. These 
will be the teaching of the young mind how to investigate the 
principles of what belongs to its trade or occupation; forming it 
to understand and perform its relations and duties to society; and 
planting the embellishments of learning, like odorous plants, 
Avhere the weeds of ignorance had otherwise grown. 

The great drawback against the mechanic trades, as regards 
their intercourse with the more polished pursuits, is not because 
they are those of labor : it is a vulgar prejudice, founded upon a 
want of reflection, that has given prevalence to (his notion. 

Industry impressses its own value, naturally, upon the consid- 
eration and esteem of every one ; and so far from diminishing its 
claims, increases them upon the community. But when it comes 
only in the gaib of industry, w^ith the crudities that belong to un- 
lettered ignorance, and the associations that pertain to such a 
condition, its one virtue is lost in the many deformities, and the 
relined and instructed shrink from (he association. 

The fault, therefore, is with (he mechanic; — he it is, who, 
neglecting his own class, separates that class from all others, and 
feeling (he effect of (he division upon hiuiself, endeavors, in some 
instances, by education, to redeem his children from a similar 
consequence. These he puts to school and instructs highly, but 
as if ashamed of his own occupation, — (hat good one (ha( has 
given him bread and abundance, — he sends forth his sons to 
struggle in the more contingent callings of the professsions. 

This is an error of false ambition; instead of helping (he great 
body of mechanics of which he was an integrant, he has injincd 
them. He has taken the learning that ought to have l)elong('(l (o 
them in the person of h;s children, and (lirown it and them, with- 
out their being united (o any knowledge of handicraft, upon (ho 
overstocked field of speculative adventurism. 



44 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

The mechanic arts comprehend a wide career of learning; (hey 
are not confined to the physical construction of implements or 
work, but extend through much of the sciences. 

Education is therefore indispensable in order that the workman 
shall know the rationale of his proceeding; and he who is only a 
tradesman, stands merely at the threshold of society, and sees in 
the distance the great household of man, without knowing its 
structure or the principles of its cohesion. 

The first move then to improve the standing of the mechanics 
should begin among themselves. They should, as a sacred duty, 
and by straining every nerve if necessary, educate their children 
and bring them up in their respective trades, so that in all respects 
they may be useful and accomplished members of the commu- 
nity, and suited to all stations. 

Society w^ants all its members to be of the most enlightened 
kind, and wants them all in close community. The better part 
of it stands like a beacon, showing its light for the haven where 
all may enter; or like a compassionate mother on the margin of 
a great stream, who looks upon all the strugglers in the tide as 
her own children, and in the anxiety of her heart, with straining 
eyes and disheveled hair, beckons them to the shore. 

Writers upon the moral economy of nations have traced much 
of the greatness of their great men, and most of their highest 
principles, to the influence of their women — to mothers, whose 
fine perception of natural religion and instinctive inclination to 
right have laid the foundation in their children of their chief 
stock of morals. This is do doubt true. They are the foun- 
tains, the very sources of virtue, and when to this is added the 
advantage of good education, they become omnipotent in their 
influences. Their control is not ephemeral — it dies not with the 
day — it passes not with their own generation, but descends, like 
a heavenly heritage, through many ages. To encourage, then, 
this natural tendency to good, we should add to its power, and in 
our range of usefulness create a desire, a determination — nay, 
even a passion to cultivate the female mind — to make the little 
girl of to-day the scholar of to-morrow, so that the instructed wife 
of a few years hence may become the industrious and talented 
matron of after days. 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 45 

It was a saying of Dr. Rush, that ^'whatever you may do for 
your sons, neglect not to educate your daughters." 

This^ perhaps, may be a digression, but I could not avoid 
pleading in behalf of that sex, which, from the Spartan mother 
who desired her son, when going to war, to return with his shield 
or upon it, inspired patriotism as well as bravery; and they of 
Israel, who, being the last at the cross and the first at the grave, 
have deserved, through all time, an honored remembrance in all 
that is good. 

The notion of some politico-economists is, that labor is divided 
into two kinds, productive and unproductive. The first is that 
which, ^'by adding to the value of some raw material, or by as- 
sisting in the increase of its quantity, realizes or fixes in a vendi- 
ble form the exertions of the laborer." The other kind of labor 
is ^'that which leaves nothing in existence after the moment of 
exertion, but perishes in the act of the performance." 

Thus, says one of that school, "the work of the farm servant 
or manufacturing laborer is fixed in a useful commodity, while 
the work of a menmX perishes with the motion of his hands and 
adds to the value of nothing. A man grows rich by eipploying 
a number of the form.er — he ruins himself by keeping a multitude 
of the latter." 

This distinction of labor is erroneous, though the conclusion as 
to the general eflfect of employing too many laborers is true. So- 
ciety is held together by the influences of industry as well as by 
those of law, and although the actual husbandman, the tiller of 
the ground, the leader in harvest time, may hold a higher rank in 
the unconsidered opinions of the multitude, still the humblest as- 
sistant in the toils of the farm, in the preparation of the food and 
the various ramifications of indiscriminate duty, is as important a 
feature in the general system of productiveness, as the most con- 
spicuous and more appreciated assistant. 

The whole in any system is a confederation of industry, in 
which the minor are indispensable accessories to (he greater; so 
that all labor is useful, all is productive, and all honorable. 

The diversity of pursuits should make no diflercnce as to merit ; 
and the only distinction to prevail, should be in favor of (hose 
who are the most industrious, the most intelligent, and the most 
faithful in their vocations. 



L 



46 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

The political institutions of tlie country which teach an equal* 
ity of caste as well as of rights; — the destruction of the laws of 
primogeniture, under which, formerly, ancestral properly was 
confined to the elder son of a family, have distributed estates so 
generally and caused them to be divided into so many shares ac- 
cording to ihe number of heirs, that few persons find themselves 
rich by inheritance; hence the necessity for labor; and as the 
laudable emulation of men to improve keeps mankind in action, — 
they carry out the divine inspiration of industry and add to its 
natural nobleness the maxim of republican policy, —that all labor 
is Iwiiorable, 

May this be a prevailing feature in the career of our country* 
men, and the implements of their trade be held in more esteem 
than " the order of the Bath" or the "■ Thistle." 

May they, in their practical results, be the true golden fleece of 
Colchis, richer than that sought for in ancient times. May those 
tools of handicraft be looked upon metaphorically, as the Penates 
or household gods were among the Romans, beings or sources of 
succor inculcating industry as a domestic moral, and its practice 
as a new commandment. 

Formerly it was held that the only means of increasing wealth 
were by agriculture and manufactures, though it was always ad* 
mitted that, necessarily, the husbandman added more by the aid 
of nature to the common slock. 

The fact that the sustenance of man is drawn from the earth 
has always given husbandry a fixed position as an element of 
life, but political economists had long striven to show that ujanu- 
faclures constituted exclusively the other source in the wealth of 
a nation. 

This theory has varied, in different countries, according to the 
influence of capital; and sometimes the votaries of the loom — 
who realize, from the force of surplus money operating upon the 
industry of others, large revenues in the form of profits upon in- 
vestments — succeeded in convincing multitudes as well as satisfy* 
ing themselves, that their theory was true. 

Of late years, however, the actual augmentation of wealth pro- 
duced by the division of labor, which is subservient to the collec- 
tion and distribution of the commodities produced by agricultural 
and manufacturing classes, shows that it is the diversity^ and va- 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 47 

rious pursuits of man in tlie general field of industry, which 
make up (he sum total of national wealth and its increase. 

From this practical proof against all speculations, mankind is 
going on throughout the world to encourage the brotherhood of 
industry; so that the plough, the loom and anvil, may be co-la- 
borers and co-producers in the great confederation of universal 
usefulness. 

It is, as it were, the offering of Ceres, Pallas, and Vulcan, at 
the footstool of Jupiter, in gratitude for his protection of tlieir 
labors. If we could begin life with the experience of our afier 
years, perhaps the majority of men would be tillers of the ground; 
for it is an inviting source of health and independence. In a 
philosophical view, it is certainly the happiest; as, while we 
compel the fields to yield up from their fruitfulness, and all vege- 
tation to contribute to our comforts as well as our wants, (he 
retired occupation keeps us clear of the varied (emptations of 
cities as well as those evil thoughts w'hich are the troublesome 
tenants of idle hours. 

But time has no reversion — it is always onward, and yields its 
fruits, like the seasons, only to (hose who speed with it. i3esides, 
if all men were wise in the beginning, all would be alike; com- 
petidon would cease, the arts and manufactures would languish, 
and variety, which gives so many colors to the enterprises of life, 
would cease to be. 

It is in the social as in (he physical world, ^^all nature's dis- 
cord makes all nature's peace." 

As we cannot all be agriculturalists or artisans, because difTer- 
ence of opinion or of tastes will lead many to depend upon the 
contingent occupations of life, we must endeavor to fix the mind 
upon such of (hem as produce usefulness to the public, profit to 
ourselves, and, as far as practicable, to catch that uncertain, eva- 
nescent object, happiness, which a wise man of Greece has said 
no man should boast of until the hour of his death. 

The leading evil of society is its unoccupied members; it will 
continue to be so with augmented dangers, as our jjopulation in- 
creases, unless some changes take place either in the voluntary 
organization of society, or by legal constraint. The first can oc- 
cur only by a sense of the necessity as well as safety felt by every 
one, that every member of a comnumity shall have a calling;— 



4S ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

the second, by an act of the legislature requiring every parent and 
guardian to have his children or wards instructed in a means of 
livelihood. This, in what is termed a free country, might seem 
to be a rigid recommendation, but it must be remembered that 
the excess of freedom in any condition is licentiousness; and that 
the best inheritance for a child is education, and teaching how to 
think and how to work. 

Cain had no trade — he became a wanderer; a mark was set 
upon him that he might not be slain — not because he was entitled 
to protection, but that his condition might be an example to all 
men, of the evil of idleness as well as of crime. 

Education and employment lead to independence; these, with 
the morals inculcated by the tender voice of the mother, and those 
imparted by parental example, make us good members of society, 
and life pass easy; so that if fate, in after years, overtakes us at 
an unexpected time, we may, like Socrates, welcome the messen- 
ger and breathe a prayer of thanks for our readiness. 

The social system of the world is like the general organization 
of nature, and comprehends an almost endless variety. We have 
artisans, men of professions, merchants, manufacturers, laborers, 
husbandmen, navigators, and many of promiscuous callings. 

Fortune too is differently distributed; some are wealthy, others 
independent only by hard labor, and many poor; but still, if the 
condition of all could be analyzed, the good diminished by the 
bad, and the real and imaginary causes of troubles of some, offset 
against their riches; if indeed happiness were to be tested by the 
greatest wealth, coupled with the greatest merit, the least care and 
the fewest complaints, afflictions and misfortunes; if the integu- 
ments or outward draper}' which conceals the reality of man's 
feelings could be removed and his true state be exposed, we should 
find that all are so alike wanting in what constitutes either the 
true gifts of fortune, in a worldly point of view, or a contented 
state, that not one, however humble his condition, would be will- 
ing in all respects to exchange it for that of another. 

The capacities and intellects of men, as well as their positions 
in life, are made different; their tastes and propensities are vari- 
ant, and for wise purposes. 

The industrious are like the bee, who, besides maintaining 
themselves, furnish food for even the despoiler — this is accora- 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 4^- 

plishing the great object of life; none can do more, and let him 
who has arrived at that end console himself, that if he has added 
honesty to his deeds, he has laid up his treasurers ^^where the 
inoih cannot destroy, nor thieves break in and sleal." 

The idle and the lazy are like the intoxicated, whom the Athe- 
nians used to exhibit to their youth, that their debased condiiion 
might deter them from imitating. The strong are imbued with a 
chivalry of exerting their strength to protect the weak; the infirm 
call out our sympathies for their helplessness, and the unfortunate 
create emotions of tenderness for their afflictions. 

The rich are enabled to dispense their wealth in enterprises, 
buildings, enjoyments, the encouragement of learning, and the 
indulgence of luxuries, that compensate the artist, the manufac- 
turer, the navigator, the husbandman, and the laborer. The 
scholar throws open the treasures of past ages and present learn- 
ing, and the type of the printer spreads them, like flying thoughts, 
to the four corners of the earth. The mechanic, by the success 
of the merchant, or the farmer, or some other votary of industry 
and fortune, sees cosily edifices raised by his hands, giving shelter 
and comfort to thousands of occupants. 

The professional man acts in the same wise in his calling — • 
giving and receiving. The farmer feeds, the manufacturer 
clothes, the sailor brings from distant countries, and the merchant 
sells the choicest productions of nature and of art; and, finally, 
all men acting in concert in the great scheme of society, perform 
the parts allotted to them in that universal drama of life. 

Let us, then, not envy the rich or the high or the great, but 
rather admire their condiiion, hope a continuance of their pros- 
perity, and look upon them as so many store houses of Providence, 
in private hands, set apart to fulfil in the gradual operations of 
society all the encourageiYients of industry. 

On the other hand, let us regard the striving man, the industrt- 
ous of all classes, whether he be rich or poor, as brothers; as so 
many workers in the same cause, though in diflferent paths; and 
finally, in all the ramifications of socieiy, let us look upon one 
anoiher as so many essential components of a great whole; as 
pillars in a noble edifice, whose foundation is divine and whose 
structure is immortal. 
4 



Gfi 



ADDRESSES DELIVEilED BEFORE 



ANNXAL ADDRESS 

Delivered at the Third Axxc.al Exhibition of the 
Maryland Institute, October 30th, iSoO, 

BY C . J . M . G W I X X , ESQ., 

Of BJlLTIHORE. 



Mr. President and Gentlemen of the Institute : — I 
have been desired, by a committee of your body, to supply the 
place of the Hon. Mr. Cooper, who is prevented by indispositioti 
from appearing before you. It is a matter of sincere regret to 
me, that you should have suflTered this disappointment; because 
bis familiar acc[uainf ance with the industrial pursuits of this coun- 
try and the civilized world, ensured an address full of infornna- 
tion and of wise counsel. On ihe other hand. I know that the 
three days allowed me for preparation is a brief space for one less 
experienced in the details of your various professions than most, 
if not all, of those around him, and who brings to your service 
this evening no other aid, than a mind anxious to advance the 
best interests of that department in which you have labored so 
successfully. 

You are about brinsrins^ to a conclusion another of a series of 
Annual Exhibiiions, the good effects of which are even now 
manifest. It is true that the larger spread of literature, and the 
facility with which men traverse the globe from one quarter to 
another, have done much to make us acquainted with the im- 
provements in art and science, and with the comforts and luxuries, 
which follow every where in their train. But unhappily the 
publications in which this information is found, although dis- 
seminated at a lighter cost than many other works of public 
utility, are yel of such a na ure that the education which they 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 51 

require, make the larger part of our community strangers to the 
advance of science in other sections of the world. And aUhough 
avenues of communication are daily opening with all our kind, — 
and although Berlin, Liverpool, Manchester, Vienna, Edinburg, 
Paisley, Leeds, and Brussels, — are more easy of access to our- 
selves, tlian were Boston and New Orleans to our grandsires, yet 
the larger number of us have an imperfect idea only of the state 
of their civilization, and are in no situation to avail ourselves of 
the hints and information which it might afford. I say this with 
the more confidence, because it is always a matter of surprise to 
me, in vi&iting our sister cities, to observe the difference in the 
economy of their buildings, in the structure of their carriages, in 
those minor details of physical comfort, which would, one might 
suppose, most readily extend from the work-shops of one city to 
those of another. But the case is otherwise; — and, removed from 
the daily view of what is progressing elsewhere, ingenious 
men either labor industriously to perfect that which is already 
achieved, or else, cut off from the suggestions, which varied con- 
trivances make to an inquiring mind, they adhere to the rule and 
manner, which their fathers pursued, 

I know that in certain inventions, the result is widely different. 
The importance of the steam engine, — the invention of Print- 
ing, — the adaptation of Magnetic Electricity to telegraphic pur- 
poses, — commend themselves at once to the notice of the whole 
scientific world. — But it must be remembered that discoveries do 
not always proceed at such giant strides, and that even when they 
do thus advance, there is need for a painful, laborious process; — a 
miniature skill and subtlety of invention, — to use, in the most per- 
fect manner, and to the best advantage, the power which one 
original genius has brought under control. To the hints and 
observations of lesser men, — to the experience of those who are 
entrusted with the management of such inventions, much that 
made them valuable has always been owing. And although no 
man, without marked injustice, could detract from the credit 
which Walt has received in the adaptation of steam as a motive 
power, or from Fulton for the attempt to apply it to purposes of 
navigation, or from Guttenburg \i\ printing, yet would we eqiially 
<5iT if we passed over the immense advantages which the su^^ges- 



52 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

lions of men, some known and some unknown, have conferrecJ 
upon the mechanic use of the elements which these sought ta 
employ. It is then the plain duty of those, who have the in- 
terests of science most at heart, to enlarge the class of intelligent, 
well-insirucied and observing men, and to place within their 
reach and power all the means and facilities, which science can 
afford, for quickening their minds to thoughtful efforts at improve- 
ment. The intelligence which may not coivipass the idea of 
applying magnetic electricity to the uses of a telegraph, — may 
yet curiously inspect the process of registration, and invent an 
alphabet, which dispenses with a serious inconvenience in lis 
raaQagernent. The genius that applied the power of steam, 
easily fell short in that minor dexterity of adaptation, which af- 
forded a ready means of adjusting all the parts of the machine to 
each other, in such a manner els to afford the largest dispensation 
of hand -labor. Yet the skill and observation, — the frequent 
trials, successes and failures of such men, have done as much to 
advance the interests of science, if results only were measured, as 
the original contrivance itself. For important as was the triumph 
of Fulton, when his boat made a successful voyage on the Hud- 
son river, there was less difference in actual results, compared 
with ihe mode of travel then in use on sailing vessels, than there 
now is between the craft in which he laboriously paddled, at six 
or seven miles an hour, and the magnificent steamers, which ply 
day after day at eighteen and twenty miles per iiour on the same 
waters. Yet while Fulton has won his way to immortality, and 
with great reason, few, save practical machinists, have heard of 
those jnen, whose skill and ingenuity have wrought so wonder- 
ful an improvement. The reason is manifest, however, and should 
not discourage any man, who enters upon such a labor. The 
suggestions and improvements effected have been the work of 
many minds, and the original idea was the ground plan on which 
they labored. One lifetime, and the necessities of most men, 
do not afford sufficient room for that profound study and patient 
experience, which such perfection in detail would require. 
Each has performed his duty when he has added, according to 
his ability, some new facility to the application of an useful in- 
vention. And it is the best office that society can perform. 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 53 

knowing, as it does, that its arts and civilization were not the 
work of one raee, or of one set of men, but the slow and labori- 
ous process of thinkers and artizans in all ages past, to do what 
it can to direct the attention of mankind to the ameh'oration of 
iiis physical state, and so to educate its youth that the largest 
number may contribute to the perfection of what wednily enjoy. 

This quickening of the common intellect such exhihibitions, 
-as you have heen engaged in, are eminently calculated to pro- 
mote. As I have before said, they bring to the attention of your 
own workmen and mechanics, specimens of art, industry and 
^contrivance, with which they were not familiar, and which the 
general confinement of their occupations gave them little oppor- 
tunily of examining. And I am sure, although I speak without 
the means of verifying my remark, and appealing only to those 
whose observation v^ill sustain me, that such exhibiiions, as we 
have witnessed, have done much to develope a spirit of inquiry 
and useful effort among the master-mechanics and workmen of 
the State. 

We have no need to rely upon such conjectures for certain in- 
formation as to the good which these <' Fairs" are capable of 
bringing about. In England they were early resorted to as con- 
venient means of showing the produce of a district in a mar- 
ketable shape, and thus attracting a greater variety of purchasers 
and of attendance. They were not, however, designed as exhi- 
bition of merchandize eomuch as markets; and they were called 
only by the name of which we have spoken, because they were 
held less often than the common markets, — were more numerous- 
ly attended, and because those tiaveling to and from them en- 
joyed certain privileges which they did not possess at other times. 
They served to bring together, and make ftimiliar with each 
other the residents of diflerent countries; and the arts and pio- 
ductions of each were thus more readily interchanged. In other 
countries the same good plan was followed. The difficulty of 
interchanging their products made a common place of traffic in- 
dispjjnrable. The Fairs of Germany are still of great importance, 
and the book-trade and exhibition, among that author-people, at 
the Fair of Leipsic, is said to be an extraoidinary spectacle. 
There are three a year, each lasting three weeks. In Frankfort 



54 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFQRE 

on the Mayne there are two a year, and in Brunswick two-. 
Similar Fairs are also held in Allessandria and Sinigaglia in 
Italy, at Lyons and Beaucaire in France, Balzario in the Tyrol, 
Zurzack in Switzerland, Warsaw in Poland, and at Nizni- 
Novgorod in Russia. The last, which is of great magnitude and 
imporlance, was attended some time in the past few years by a 
young American, who has given a most inteyesting and agreeable 
account of its merchandize, and of the general manner in which 
business was conducted by those who were there collected fiom 
all parts of Russia, from China, and from the countries round 
about the Persian Gulf and Caspian Sea. 

Our Fairs are not, however, as these were, the wants of 
commerce. They are needed only as places for interchange 
of opinion,— as schools of invention, as repositories of art, — as 
incentives to mechanic industry and invention, — and as the 
means of bringing into closer contact and nearer sympathy, men 
whose avocations draw them too much apart, and who are, in 
general, more isolated than their own interests, or those of society 
require. To those of us, who are appointed to deliver words of 
counsel and encouragement, they present fitting occasions for 
comparison of that which we see before us, with what our ances- 
tors, or the men of a few years past have achieved, in order that 
we may educate those over whom we have charge, to pursue, with 
the same steadfastness and industry, and with the more abundant 
help, which art, science and invention have afforded, ihe luminous 
path of knowledge yet to come. 

I can, I am sure. Gentlemen, perform the duly assigned me 
by your committee, in no more agreeably manner, than by re- 
lating, as succinctly as I can, the wonderful advance which science 
with its sister-handmaids has achieved within, I might almost 
say, the memory of man, in order that you may know how the 
same intelligence and industry, applied to other branches of art, 
will achieve results at which our posterity will stand as much 
surprised, as we now aie at what the men of this genera- 
tion have accomplished. I select the manufacture of cot- 
ton, because it is one of the great staples of our country, and 
for the reason also that the necessary facilities for its growing use 
were supplied by the wouderful genius of an American me- 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 55 

chanic, whose invention, though it brought liltle profit to him- 
self, vvil! redound always lo his honor, and will reflect an undying 
light upon the services of ihat class among whom he labored. 
I need not say to you, that I mean Eli Whitney, the inventor 
of the cotton-gin. 

The majority of us are perhaps strangers to the history and 
cultivation of a plant which is so large an element in the wealth 
of our Soutliern stales. Herodotus described it four hundred and 
fifty years before Christ, by saying *'that wild trees bear fleeces 
as their fruit, surpassing those of sheep in beauty and excellence j 
and the people of the East use clothes made from the same trees.'' 
Another said that ^^ihere were trees in India which bore wool." 
And another, writing in time of Alexander the Great, that 
••''the trees from which the Indians made cloihs; have a leaf like 
that of the black mulberry; but the whole plant resembles the 
Dog Rose. They set them in the plains arranged in rows, so as 
to look like vines at a distance." Again, — "the wool-bearing 
trees had a leaf like that of the vine, but smaller; they bore no 
fruit, but the capsule containing the wool, was, when closed, 
about the size of a quince; when ripe, it expanded so as to emit 
the wool, which was woven into clothes either cheap or of great 
value." So too it was said in the same age, that the clothes 
made of it were finer and whiter than any other. The army of 
Antony, with which he entered Egypt, was represented to have 
been clothed with it. It was in use among the Greeks and Ro- 
mans before Silk was employed as a material for wear; and the 
word which signified it is traced by Scholars, westward from India, 
in the Sanscrit, Arabic and Persian Languages. The word oc- 
curs, it is said, once in Scripture, in the book of Esther, although 
there translated as ^' green," by the authors of the common Ver- 
sion. The instance alluded to is the description of the hangings 
in the Palace at the feast of Ahashueras. Cotton cloths were 
used by the Greeks 200 yeais before the Christian Era, and were 
among the luxuries of Vcrres in Sicily. A RoiDaii Poet asked 
that his bones, after dcaih, might bo dritnl with cotton napkins. 
Another s[)caks of the material, as the sail of a bhip. In Arabia, 
in the ninth century, the common dress was of cotton. And 
on the discovery of the American Continent, coUon fabrics form- 



no ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

ed the principal ar[icle of clothing. It was of all colors. The 
plant grew wild in the Islands and on the Coniineni of South 
America; and in 1529. Magellan discovered that the Natives of 
Brazil made their beds of this material. In some portions of the 
old world it was wrought into a coarse fabric, but in India the 
manufacture attained a degiee of perfection which has never been 
surpiissed, even by the most delicate machinery which the skill 
of man could invent. 

"We can scarcely credit the extraordinary fineness of these cloths, 
or understand the perfection which the workmen in that distant 
country had attained so many centuries ago. "Whole garments 
could be drawn through a ring of moderate size. The coloring 
was so rich that it became livelier the moie ilje fabric was washed. 
They were whitened with lemon-juice, and were so thin that the 
thread was scarcely discoverable. '"Those of the rich, especially, 
were so remarkable,*' says an old traveller, "that twenty-five or 
thirty elis of it put into a turban, will not weigh four ounces." 
In England, in the seventeenth century, these goods were 
wittily called the shadow of a commodity. A Missionary at 
Serampore. said that the muslins made by some families were so 
fine, that when laid upon the grass, they became invisible, after 
the dew had fallen upon them. These accounts can scarcely be 
disregarded as extravagant. Sir Charles Wilkins brought some 
of the Dacca muslin from India, in 1TS6, presented to him as 
t!ie fiaesr made at the Conjpany's Facioiy. He gave a portion 
of the skein to Sir Joseph Banks, who found that it weighed 
thirty-four and three-tenih grains. Its whole length was. one 
thousand and eighteen yaids and seven inches. A pound avoi- 
dupois would measure 114 miles, 2 furlongs, and CO yards. A 
pound of cotton, how^ever, it is fair to say, had been spun in 
England into a thread of 167 miles in length. 

But it can easily be imagined, that notwithstanding the won- 
derful perfection attained in cotton cloths, centuries ago, the pro- 
cess of manufacture must have been extremely laborious, so rude 
were the machines which were used in cleaning the raw material. 
It was the good fortune of this Country to produce a man whose 
power of invention supplied a machine so simple in its parts, that 
it was capable of easy construction, and so perfect in iis working 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 57 

that it rendered the material which nature bouniifully supplied 
in our Southern States, an unfailing source of revenue to them- 
selves, and a staple upon which the manufacturing industry of 
their own population and that of neighboring communities, 
might ceaselessly employ itself. Of the life and attainments of 
Eli Whitney, 1 will say nothing. For a long season he vainly 
struggled to gain some advantage from his invention. But 
prejudice and cupidity, — the ease with which the machine 
could be manufactured, — together with sectional antipathies, 
were all brought to bear upon the unfortunate inventor, — and 
while juries sat within the very sound of the working of the gin, 
evidence of use could not be obtained. It is unhappily true tliat 
those who have best served their kind by inventions, have not 
always reaped the reward of their labor. In general, this result 
has followed from the slow recognition of the merit of the inven- 
tion. But, in Whitney's case, this was at once recognized. 
His place of deposit was broken open, and machines taken and 
imitated before a patent was obtained. His rights were set at 
defiance. A sovereign State paid him but a pittance only for the 
use of his invention, — a pittance which, however, he was com- 
pelled to accept, because he had the choice between this and 
useless litigation alone. Although one whose opportunities and 
capacity entitled him to speak with authority, said that I he value 
of properly in the cotton growing Stales had been raised fifty per 
cent., and that the benefits of the invention exceeded one hun- 
dred millions of dollars, the inventor received nothing, except 
from North and South Caiolina, — for these were the only States 
which recognized in any degree, howsoever imperfect, the im- 
mense benefits which hud been conferred upon (hem. When he 
applied for the renewal of the patent, he was defeated by an ac- 
tive and organized opposiiion. And had it not been (hat the 
Government of the United Stales liberally gave him a contract 
for arms, the chief instrument in the proeperiiy of our Southern 
States would have died a beggar. 

The notice of the Coiton-gin would seem to require tl-.at I 
should give some sketch of ilie adaptation of steam power to the 
machiiiciy which is used for (he fabrication of cotton cloths, and 
of the admirable invention of Sir Richard Arkwright — but a vol- 



5S ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

ume, rather than a lecture would be required for any connected 
hisiory of these inipioveiiienis, and the iiiuils within which my 
sense of your pmience confines nie, warns me against entering 
upon any topic that may protract this lecture beyond reasonable 
bounds. 

I pass, therefore, wiihout hesitation, from the machine, wMiich 
in conneciion with ihe triumph of Walt, has revolutionized the 
physical stale of the world, to an invention more minute and 
complicated, but of fur earlier date, and whose history is full of 
interest and instruction. The history of the mechanism of clocks 
and walches has long been a subject of curious research, and, in 
what I am about to say, I pretend to neither originality or pro- 
found investigation, but have sought only to place in a conveni- 
ent and agreeable form what is readily accessible to any inquirer. 
The theory of some is that a zodiacal clock was invented early in 
the third century, and that the machine drew upon itself the in- 
dignation of St. Polycarp, because it adopted those old signs of 
Jupiter, Capricorn, Scorpio, and the Bull, and the like, which 
yet adorn our almanac compilations. All the timepieces, how- 
ever, up to the eleventh century seem to have been moved by 
water. Some mention is then made in the life of an abbot of 
Hirshaw of one tliat went by macfiinery. And in the customs 
of the Cistercian Convent, compiled in the twelfth century, a 
clock is spoken of which could be so regulated as to wake the 
Sacristan before the matins or nocturns. These machines, 
probably moved by weights, are thought to have been used in 
Europe from the eleventh century. The invention, however, is 
claimed as Saracenic, for the Soldan of Egypt sent the Emperor 
Fredeiick one that went of itself with great accuracy, and point- 
ed out the hours of the day and night with certainty. In the 
fourteenth century they increased in numberj since there are re- 
cords of clocks belonging to Richard de Wallingford, Hubert, 
Prince of Carrara, to the State of Bologna, to Charles Y. of 
France, to Stiasburg, Courlrai, Nuremberg, Venice, and Cosmo 
de Medici at Florence. In 128.^, a fine imposed upon the 
Chief Justice of the King's Bench, was appropriated to the pur- 
chase of a Clock for the use of the Courts of Law, And in the 
fourteenth century, the striking of a Clock was a sound com- 



THE xMARYLAND INSTITUTE. 59 

mon enouo^h ia Encrland to furnish a siniile to Chaucer. I will 
not pursue an account of (he instances in wiiich they are record- 
ed to have existed, — but will stay only to notice the fact that 
they appear to have been regarded rather as toys than as for ac- 
tual service. There were smaller and more portable Clocks, per- 
haps Watches, then in existence, — and the Emperor Chailes V. 
used to keep several around his wine bottle upon the table, to 
amuse him when at dinner. In his retirement at the Monastry 
at St. Just, he occupied himself with regulating an assortment. 
These Watches were portable Clocks, it would seem, because 
when Charles Y. and Louis XI, were robbed, the thief w^as de- 
tected by their striking the time audibly under his garments. 

Such Watches, however, and even those used in the days of 
Queen Elizabeth, were very ditferent from those now in common 
use. They were about the size of a dessert plate. I should be 
glad if 1 had time to trace their history, from their rude begin- 
nings to their present perfection, — but 1 have notsufficient space. 
The Anchor Escapement was invented by a Londoner, in 16S0; 
the "dead beat" or " Graham Escapement," about 1724, — and 
Harrison's compound pendulum, designed to counteract the ef- 
fect of tempeiature in metals employed a little later. John Ar- 
nold, in 1764, constructed a Repealing Watch for George the 
Third, which was the smallest ever known. It was less then 
six tenths of an inch in diameter, and repeated the hours, quar- 
ters, and half-hours. It was the size of a silver English two- 
pence, and its weight was that of a sixpence. No feat of me- 
chanical skill probably ever equalled this. He subsequently in- 
vented the Detached Escapement, known by his name. He 
first introduced jewels into Watches and Clocks, and invented 
the cylindrical spring and compensation balance and their appli- 
cation to the Chronometer. 

It is scarcely possible to estimate the importance of the service 
which he thus rendered to navigation. The determination of 
the longitude of a vessel at sea, was a problem which had drawn 
from Pkilip IIL of Spain, as eaily as 159S, an ofler of oOO,{)00 
crowns for its solution. Newton suggested that it might be done 
by the aid of an accurate time-piece, but it seemed to the men of 
of science of his d[\y , and up to the lime of Arnold's invention, 



60 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

impossible to construct one of sufficient accuracy to accomplish 
the end designed. Of whatever advantage Astronomical Clocks 
may be to the purposes of science, and however convenient, for 
our ordinary purposes, are the accurate Watches which we now 
possess, it is certain that the whole invention is productive of 
most advantage to mankind in the result arrived at by Arnold in 
the construction of the Chronometer. Thousands of men and 
an immense portion of the wealth and produce of the world, are 
yearly upon the sea, — and all the interests of art and Govern- 
ment, — of humanity indeed, depend upon the safe, easy and 
expeditious passage of the element which divides the continents 
from each other. Without the Chronometer, a vessel is almost at 
the mercy of the element. No computation, however careful, can 
accurately account for the varying forces of wind and current; 
and until this wonderful invention supplied the Mariner with the 
means of safety, his way on strange seas was one of perpetual dan- 
ger. Now, on the other hand, though he be weeks from shore, 
the observation of one clear sky, and the reckoning of his Chro- 
nometer, enable him to note the place of his vessel upon his chart 
with more certainty than he could locate the position of his 
dwelling house at home, on the plat of his native town. 

I have alluded. Gentlemen, to the invention of the Steam En- 
gine, — the Cotton Gin, — the Chronometer, as the final perfec- 
tion of Clocks and Watches, — and I feel that if I add to these 
remarks a brief notice of that system of Rail Roads which are 
now developing to sudden wealth the internal resources of our 
Country, I shall have placed before you within a narrow compass, 
some of the most important elements of our modern civilization. 
I enter upon this subject with the more pleasure, because our 
own prosperity must hereafter be largly connected with the suc- 
cess of such a work For however bountiful nature may have 
been in opening an entrance for the sea into the very bosom of 
our fertile territory, — and however happily we may be placed 
secure from the accidents of war and tempest, at the farthest end 
of its reach of waters, yet the territory on which we stand, and 
(hat beside the waters of our bay, is not large enough to furnish 
a just proportion of employment to the energy and capital we 
can command. Before us is a highway open to the ends of the 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 6-1 

globe. We have the power to enter into all ports, to bear the 
produce of our industry to all climes, — and we will prosper pre- 
cisely in proportion as our internal wealth, and the material we 
can command, will enable us to make our City a great commer- 
cial emporium. Behind us lies a vast terriiory of inexhaustable 
mineral and agricultural capacity, to which our harbor can be 
made an outlet, and our market a place of destination. It is cut 
off from us by a range of hills, to whose farther bases nature 
has opened a highway from the plains westward of the State of 
Missouri, and from the fertile wheat, lands of Iowa and Wisconsin. 
To secure the endless and profuse growth of these Western gar- 
dens, nothing has been required of us but that we should put our 
hand to the work which nature has begun, and make the Ohio 
tributary to ourselves. 

It is strange to reflect, when v^e stand upon the road passing 
from the Western section of our City, how slowly and surely 
the idea there embodied has developed itself. In patriarchal 
times the camel found its difficult way over a track left by its 
fellows. Later, the convenience of neighborhoods marked out 
and kept open a path for purposes of ordinary intercourse j and 
these grew broader and smoother as travel increased, — for the in- 
convenience of a rough and perilous route was soon felt. The 
people of Carthage paved their highways; and the Romans, fol- 
lowing their example, not for the purposes of commerce, but of 
war, opened through all the countries over which they exercised 
power, those magnificent roads, the remains of which surpass the 
slighter constructions of our modern art. We are apt to forget 
the civilization of those who have gone before us, and in our 
own inventions and works of art, to under- value the greatness 
achieved by the ancients. But when we consider that the Ro- 
mans opened a highway from Spain, through France to the 
Alps, — that their great roads traversed Italy in all directions, — 
that the countries now known as Savoy, Dauphine, Provence 
and Germany, — that Asia, India, Hungary, and Ancient Mace- 
donia, were all crossed by a net-work of military roads, construct- 
ed in general of solid blocks of stone, and raised above the sur- 
face of the level ground, — we caimot but feel that anterior to the 
construction of Rail Roads, we were infinitely behind them in 



^ ADRRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

avenues for (ravel. No difficulty impeded them. They exca- 
vated moimtainsj and filled up valleys, — their roads were straight 
lines, as if their energy and pride set the obstacles of nature at 
defiance. In modern times they have had but one rival as a 
builder, and that was N.ipoleon, wlio in the road of the Simplon 
seem to have entered into competiiion with the genius and 
audacity of the Roman Consuls. But the history of road-travel 
in the sevenieenth and eighteenth century, in England, shows 
what small advance — nay, — what retrogression it had undergone. 
In 1750, merchandise was transported in Scotland only on pack- 
horses. The carrier between Edinburg and Selkirk, a distance 
of thirty. eight miles, lequired a fortnight for his journey, going 
and returning; and then travelled in the bed of a stream as the 
best road. In 16TS, a contract was established for a coach line 
between Edinburg and Glasgow, a distance of forty-four miles, 
the journey between the (wo places, to and fro, required six 
days. In 1750, the stage coach from Edinburg to Glasgow was 
thiity-six hours on (lie journey. In 1849, by a rou(e (hree miles 
longer, it was made in an hour and a half 1 s(ate these times of 
travel, only in order that you may know that our boastful mo- 
derns must have been far inferior to (he ancienis in all the conve- 
niences of travel, else would they have given better proof of their 
civilization. Of the travel in our own State, there is not much 
to be said. Any one of you, by looking at the Baliimore Daily 
Repository, of 1793, may see the advertisement of the Philadel- 
phia Stages, which left Baltimore three times a week, at four 
o'clock in the morning, and arrived in Philadelphia next day to 
dinner. The roads being, according to the advertisement, very 
superior. 

I do not intend to enter into any history of the progress of Rail 
Roads, — nor shall I argue what country, or individual, may pro- 
perly claim the credit of their earliest use. There are many, doubt- 
less, now present, who remember the opening of that great work 
which is rapidly tending to completion, l^ie men who designed 
it were in advance of their day. Its early beginning appeared to 
the common observer only as a ready mode of access to the place 
of resort upon the route it followed. And despite tiie zeal and 
confidence of its projectors, now^ soon to be realized by a fruition 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 63 

more glorious than (hey anticipated, it was difficult for any one 
to see the elements of future greatness and utility of whicli they 
spoke, shadowed in the well known Dromedary Car, and in the 
team of horses that dragged it to and from (he Carroll Viaduct. 
But time has cured our scepticism, and in the anticipation of the 
good to come, we can forget our years of long delay, and the 
burden of our public debt, and feel that the end to be achieved 
will richly repay the cost of the undertaking. 

In all the labors, gentlemen, to which we have here alluded, — 
in all which could be named as having contributed to the com- 
fort, convenience and civilization of the world in which we 
live, the class whose interest you foster, have borne a noble part. 
There have been men withdrawn from such labors, who in the 
seclusion of their closels supplied the formulai for your directions 
and deduced general principles of science, which it has been 
your office to apply. Bui, in the main, ihe stately cities wliich 
are scattered over the land, — -the ships that bear their cargoes in 
safely from farlhest India to our shores, — ihe implements that 
have subdued our rugged soil, or adapted its luxurious fertility to 
the growth of necessary crops, — the machinery, which on all 
sides, with unresting arms, is performing the work of ten thou- 
sand men, with an accuracy, strength, and perfection of labor, 
beyond the reach of muscular force, — the lines of R[iil-Way 
that stretch out from our limits to places seemingly divided by 
natuie from us,— (he myriad aits that make our lives easy, and 
our homes pleasant, — have all sprung from the indusir}^, intelli- 
gence and genius of the class to which you belong. 

The literature of a State is its noblest pride, for it best endures 
the force of lime, and quickens into activity the intellects of men, 
who are to succeed in the administration of the public business, 
or in the advancement of that fund of general intelligence which 
is (he portion of the world. But it must be remen)bered (hat 
Literature is the foster child of art,— and that labor, made intel- 
ligent by practice and observation, nuist have added to the physi- 
cal comforts and ameliorated the condition of the world, before 
the impel ishable portion of our letters can find soil in which to 
take its proper root. Virgil and Horace would have never sung 
had not the matured and splendid luxury of Rome aflbided room 



64 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

and stimulus enough to develop their genius to its perfection. 
And we must not, because its ancient palaces have decayed, and 
the remains of its antique art and civilization dwindled to a few 
broken vases and mutilated statues, under-esiimate the vital in- 
fluence which that civilization exercised upon their minds, when 
it was in life and vigor. 

I need not, at this day and in this country, show to you the 
importance of elevating mechanical skill to its proper station. 
The Institute which you have founded, best proclaims your 
sense of its necessity, but I may be permitted, in closing my ad- 
dress, to say one word in favor of the avocations which many of 
you pursue, and by way of earnest prompting towards a wise 
fruition of the privileges they bestow. There is not one of them 
all that does not daily open to you fields of inquiry, that are 
withdrawn from the mercantile and legal classes of the commu- 
nity. The machinist, from hour to hour, solves and applies 
problems in mathematics which have been wrought out by the 
patient labor of the greatest minds of generations past. Every 
article which he constructs is but a mark to indicate how far 
science has gone, and a subject for reflection to know whether 
his skill cannot advance its progress. That he should be dili- 
gent and well-instructed in the principles and processes of art, is 
no less his duty than his interest. And if he enter upon his avo- 
cation with an observant mind and with such information as it 
properly requires, in the wide range of practice, and in the vast 
region of space yet remaining to be traversed in the application 
of scientific principles, there is hope that he will win a name 
more glorious than conqueror ever achieved. 

**Peace hsLS her victories, 

No less renowned than War." 

And there is none greater than that triumph of industry, enriched 

by wisdom, which brings the common elements of nature into 

more perfect subservience to the economy of man, — and makes 

the Earth, created for his home and subsistence, yield abundantly 

the rich treasures which are concealed within it, — or put on a 

fresher beauty, under the labor of his hand. 

I would have you remember, in fine, in order that you may 

properly understand the due relation between your industrial pur- 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 65 

suits and those lighter arts that adorn society, that your avocations 
are as the foundalion stones, and pillared walls of the solid edi- 
fice, which encloses within its spacious area the interests of hu- 
manily. Painting has decorated its aisles, and Sculpture filled 
its shrines; the songs of Poels gladden and direct its vast proces- 
sions upon days of holiday and feasting ; and the earliest light 
of the rising sun falls upon the pinnacles by which its solid dome 
is encompassed. But it has its strength and glory not in the 
canvass that hangs upon the wall, — nor in the life-like marble of 
its Siatues, — nor in the music that enchains our sense, — nor in 
the gay procession that forever walks within it — but in the rough 
stones deep-hidden under ground, whose name and structure 
are uncertain, and in the exact and massive blocks, which 
the skill of one generation after another has put together. 
Each in itself is great or small, as the strength of the workman 
availed him in his laborious effort to hew it from the living 
quarry; — and each in itself is comparatively useless, save as a 
signal proof of human ingenuity and enterprise; — but laid to- 
gether in (heir fitting order, they form that temple of knowledge 
and of science, within which humanity may well retire to con- 
sider its noble destiny, and the infinite wisdom of God. 



M ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 



CLOSING ADDRESS 

At the Third Annual Exhibition of the Maryland 
Institute, delivered on Tuesday evening, November 
3, 1S50. 

BY JOSHUA YANSANT, ESQ., 

PRESIDENT OF THE INSTITUTE. 



Ladies and Gentlemen: — It is my agreeable duty, as the 
PresidenL of the Maryland Institute, to announce to whora have 
been awarded premiums, medals, and diplomas, for the best 
specimens of their respectitve arts. The judges selected for the 
discrimination of the various works of industry have experienced 
no slight embarrasment, because of the difficulty in many cases 
of making a proper estimate of the difference in articles, all of 
which exhibited marked excellence. Those gentlemen were 
selected by the Institute because of the knowledge they possessed 
of their particular art, and for their well known impartiality of 
character; if therefore their decisions should fail of pleasing all 
the competitors for the prizes of surpassing merit, such failure, in 
all justice, should be ascribed to no improper feeling on the part 
of the arbiters, but to a difference of opinion which is inseparable 
from the judgment of fallible minds. 

No one can look upon the scene here presented, in the ex- 
hibition of works of art, having a knowledge of the deep interest 
which it has excited in such of the Ladies and Gentlemen of 
Maryland as have witnessed it, without arriving at pleasant con- 
clusions of the improved condition of society embracing, as it 
does, individual happiness and prosperity, and displaying great 
developement of the faculties of the human mind. 

We cannot view the useful and the beautiful which are here 
displayed, without congratulating each other that our lot is cast 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 67 

in a land where all such works of improvement and art are not 
contraband to any one; that these works of the mighty mind, and 
of the cunning hand, are not reserved to a favored few, but are 
bounties to be diffused over the broad bosom of our soil and placed 
at the door of every inhabitant. It is the glory of the present age 
to point to such monuments of art as take burthens from the 
shoulders of labor — ihat increase the supply of articles of comfort 
and luxury — that bring mankind together in unions of interest, 
and in their result tend to a perfection in civilization. 

The imagination is redolent of the poetry of years passed 
away, and we ponder with wonder over descriptions of the 
lofty pyramids of Egypt; the parthenon and acropolis of Greece; 
the colossal pantheon and colloseum of the seven hill'd city; 
the gorgeous temples and the wall'd cities of old, and infer 
therefrom the wealth and prosperity of the nations in whose midst 
these stupendous structures were reared. But if we cast aside 
this drapery of the mind, and with philosophic ken penetrate the 
past; if we contemplate the absence, at such periods, of all the 
modern improvements which assist the hand of labor; if we es- 
timate the millions of human beings withdrawn from useful pur- 
suits to construct useless fabrics — and which as a consequence 
abstracts from the production of the real necessaries of life, the 
idea of either the happiness or prosperity of such nations vanishes. 
Those stupendous piles of masonry — ^^fashioned by long forgot- 
ten hands" — instead of being monuments of the glory and the 
wealth of the people of those days, should be regarded as ceno- 
taphs commemorative of the tears and the groans of an over-tasked 
and starved populace. History has culled a few bright names 
from out the wonderful past, and the pride of conquests — the 
spoils of nations, and the wealth of the few, are heralded on its 
pages; but the tale of the masses has not been told. For genera- 
tions they have toiled until the last sands of life were journeyed, 
and they passed away with voiceless thoughts. If written, their 
history would have told of labor degraded and despoiled of its 
fruit; of task masters pushing hmnan endurance to the extrem- 
est verge; of famine at (heir board and ti)c earth for their bed; and 
for their posterity a heritage of ignorance and servitude. 

Home in her palmy day, it is true, had her academies (or thft 



68 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

diffusion of literature, but these, from a combination of causes, 
were circumscribetl in their influences. She had also her Insti- 
tutions for the cuhivation of the fine arts; but the more useful 
arts — with the exception of architecture — were, in the main, ne- 
glected. Mechanical employment, as contra-distinguished from 
the finer arts, was denominated servile labor, and those engaged 
thereat were held in contempt, and from the discouraging circum- 
stances w hich surrounded them, became ignorant and self-abased. 
Her proud and ambitious citizens vainly imagined that the spoils 
which her conquering armies wrung from her adversaries, would 
give strength to the state as tiiey added brilliancy to her arms; 
that her useful but debased citizens would be content with the 
condition of "hewers of wood and drawers of water;" and that 
when Rome should fall from her greatness and power, — the fall 
of the world would be simultaneous. 

They had not learned the lesson that the hand of honest in- 
dustry should gather the fruit of its toil; that the stability of go- 
vernment is conditioned upon the intelligence, prosperity, and af- 
fections of the whole people; and that injustice to the humblest 
class of citizens engenders fixed hale, and works effective revenge. 
Hence (he dissensions and seditions which rendered her, as well 
as contemporaneous nations, a prey to violent and frequent revo- 
lutions and subsequently to foreign conquest. 

"The Goth, the Christian, time, war, flood, and fire, 

Have dea.t upon the seven hill'd city's pride; 

She saw her glories one by one expire, 

And up the steep barbarian monarch's ride 

Where the car climb'd the Capitol; far and wide 

Temple and tower went down, nor left a site; — 

Chaos of ruins! who shall trace the void, 

O'er the dim fragments cast a lunar light, 

And say "here was or is" where all is doubly nighL'" 

It was the error of the past, and is the error of monarchs and 
despots of the present day, (fatal one I trust it may prove ere long 
to the latter) to assume that the strong arm of authority can enforce 
obedience when the great heart of the people beats not in unison 
with government, or with those who may be charged with ex- 
ecuting its functions. 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 69 

"What constitutes a state? 

Not high raised battlement or laboured mound, 
Thick wall or moated gate; 

Not cities proud with spire and turrets crowned; 
Not bays and broad-arm'd ports, 

Where, laughing at the storm, ricli navies ride; 
Not starred and spangled courts, 

Where low-browed baseness wafts perfume to pride. 
No! men, high minded men, 

With powers as far above dull brutes endued 
In forest, brake, or den. 

As beasts excel cold rocks and brambles rude, 
Men, who their duties know, 

But know their rights, and knowing, dare maintain. 
Prevent the long-aimed blow. 

And crush the tyrant while they rend the chain, 
These constitute a state." 

The dark history of ancient Rome is of itself sufficient to ex- 
hibit to the menial vision, that reverence for power — the love of 
tinsell'd show, and contempt for labor, are elements of destruction, 
without referring to the tournament — the lance — the helm — the 
gilded spur, and the serf with his iron collar, of fuedal Europe. 

From the evils enumerated we should learn lessons of wisdom. 
In our own bright land when that labor, whicii is indispensable 
to human comfort, shall become degraded — when the husband- 
man, the artisan, the mechanic, and ihe laboring man, shall cease 
to reap the reward of virtuous industry — and ignorance and vice 
supplant intelligence and religion, the fate of Rome will be ours. 

Thanks to an all wise Providence, who seems fo have singled 
out us as the objects of his peculiar favor, we have no reason to 
indulge in bitter imaginings. For the present, at least, we are 
secure; and if the public domain, for the future, be withheld from 
the grasp of speculators, or what is even worse — large land hold- 
ers, and only disposed of to the actual and honafiile cidtivator of 
the soil, there will be no datigor of wealth building up in our 
midst a permanent patrician order. The representatives who are 
from time to time chosen for the congress of the nation — imder 
whose charge the public lands are placed — have upon (heir 
shoulders a weight of responsibility, in the matter of the disposi- 
tion of those lands, immensurably above all the contemptible 
trammels which political [)ariy distinctions may impose. 



70 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

The personal prosperity of man is so interwoven with his po- 
litical condition that the one necessarily depends on the other. 
Our naiionul libeny. and our political instiiuiions which are the 
emanations of that liberty, are the heritage of our forefathers se- 
cured to us at the sacrifice of blood and treasure; and the doc- 
trine of an enlightened benevolence enjoins on us the oblisraiion 
to labor, not only for ourselves, but for posterity. Under our 
government the rights of man are fully guaranteed, and it is only 
essential that each citizen shall f>erform the measure of his duty 
to insure general prosperity. No distinctions are ostensibly re- 
cognized save those which arise from superior merit; and en- 
lightened public sentiment requires that every one. that is physi- 
cally or mentally capable, shall contribute in some manner to 
promote the great end of society. 

The Hon. Air. Aiisiin said, in an address delivered before the 
Boston Mechanical Association, that •• there are no classes of re- 
spectably idle men among ns. All idlers of whatever degree, go 
by the common name of loafers. Every man, to be respectable, 
must do somethinor; and he loses his siaiion in society, if while 
he is of a proper age to labor, he has no regular or honorable 
employment." The prosperous condition of the old -'Bay 
Slate," in all that contributes to moral, intellectual, and physical 
advancement, evidences that the practice of its citizens conforms 
to his truthful sentiments. 

To the extent that men are useful to society should honors be 
awarded. This seniiment suggests the inquiry whedier as a 
class the mechanics have come up to the standard of merit I 
believe that they have, thus far, contributed more than their 
quota of benefits, and that between themselves and the rest of 
mankind, the account current will show a balance in iheir favor. 
Without the aid of mechanism the husbandman would be with- 
out his implements; the merchant without the means of trans- 
porting articles of trade; the poor mariner would not have his 
compass and chronometer to guide him on the broad deep when 
the planets of heaven wiihhold their light; human locomotion 
would depend on conveyances which nature provides; in short 
without such labor mankind could only subsist as did the tribes 
of savages that peopled America at the period of its discovery. 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 71 

In thus speaking, I repudiate ihe idea of drawing invidious 
dislinciions to the prejudice of any class of men usefully employ- 
ed. Husbandry — science — moral and inlellectual culture — mer- 
chandry — the law — medicine, &c., are meritorious of the high- 
est consideration, and even indispensable in making up the sum 
of human happiness. What I desire to enforce is — that the 
Mechanic Arts and their kindred sciences have more than con- 
tributed their share to human civilization. Their benefits are 
around and about us wheresoever we move. The genius of Frank- 
lin, of Watt, of Arkwright, and of Fulton, lives in the beautiful 
and useful machinery on every floor of this Hall. On my right 
is the wonderful electro magnectic telegraph, which by the aid 
of Mechanic Art, is capable of communicating, from one extreme 
of our country to the other, the thoughts of men with the speed 
of their conception; in the race of flight the '^swift winged ar- 
rows of light" are left far behind. On the first floor is the beau- 
tiful engine made by the ingenious Bentley, the chairman of our 
Committee of Arrangements, which is the power that puts in 
motion the loom, the plane, the mortise, and other pieces of use- 
ful machinery, in that department of the exhibition. That little 
engine with its single arm is capable of accomplishing for man- 
kind more than can a thousand strong hands unaided by machi- 
nery. 

The steam engine has peopled our rivers and shores; it has 
made the wild blossom as a garden; it has wafted wealth and 
population wherever its power has been directed; and much as 
it has accomplished it is destined to benefit the human race im- 
measurably more. In the great work of civilization, as an 
agent, it stands next to the '^\rt preservative of Arts;" that art 
whicfi diflfuses intelligence to the inmates of the palace and the 
hut; which exposes the march of corruption and vice; which 
endues wisdom with a tongue that can be heard by all nations; 
and which records the thoughts of undying genius. 

Time and the occasion will not allow nie, if I had the ability, 
to do justice to the various machines and other articles here pre- 
sented. They all evidence the mastery of mind over mailer. 
No great invention has ever been conceived without the mighti- 
est eflbrt of which the human intellect is capable; and the labor 



72 ADRRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

of science as applied (o mechanism, and also ihe skill which con- 
structs, challenges admiration and respect. 

Notwithstanding my desire (o be brief in my address, in con- 
sideration of the time which I must occupy thereafter jn announc- 
ing the awards, I cannot permit the occasion to pass without no- 
ticing, to a limited extent, the contributions to the fair which are 
of the labor and skill of lovely woman. She that was destined 
by the Divine Author of our existence to be the companion of 
n«an — to soothe him amid the trials incidental to his struggles 
through life — in whose presence he learns that substantial happi- 
ness can onl}'^ be realized in her love, and in the practice of those 
virtues which are cultivated by her and bloom ever green wnihin 
her sphere — hath manifested an interest and zeal in promoting 
the objects of the Maryland Institute meritorious of the highest 
commendation. The specimens of silk and worsted fancy work 
by Mrs. Schwing, Miss Mary and Mis? Alice Pendergast, Miss 
Leinig, Miss Toomey, Miss Willis of Baltimore county, Miss 
Banning, Miss White, Mrs. Tubman of Dorchester county, 
Miss Bryan of Cecil county, Miss Sichel, Miss Gordon, Miss 
Munroe, Miss Uhlhoff, Miss Chase, Miss Cunningham of Maine, 
Miss Gilpin, Mrs. Wagner, and by many others, are of surpassing 
merit. The robber and his child, of the same class of work, by 
Miss Laty, has won general attention and admiration, and evi- 
dences a perfection in the art, which has elicited so much of her 
mental and physical labor. The handsome specimens of needle 
work by Miss Sewell, Miss Eareckson, Mrs. S. Smith, Mrs. P. 
A. Russell and Mrs. A. A. Shriver of Frederick, Miss Harring- 
ton, Mrs. Bentzinger, and many others, demonstrate that the 
ladies of Maryland will become as distinguished for their indus- 
try and skill, as they are proverbial for their virtue and beauty. 

This grouping of the works of skill leads the mind to a fuller 
estimate of the utility of many things which having been accus- 
tomed to behold from our childhood to ripened yeais, had be-^ 
come divested of importance. It was upon an occasion like the 
present, that the Hon. Edward Everett said— with a beauty of 
language, in the use of which he is pre-eiriinent — '^consider the 
influence on the aiTairs of men, in all their relations, of the in- 
vention of the little machine which I hold in my hands; and the 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 73 

Other modern instruments for (he measurement of time, various 
specimens of which are on exhibition in the halls. To say noth- 
ing of the importance of an accurate measurement of time in as- 
tronomical observations — nothing of the application of time-keep- 
ers to the purposes of navigation — how vast must be the aggregate 
effect on the affairs of life, throughout the civilized world, and 
in the progress of the ages, of a convenient and portable appa- 
ratus for measuring the lapse of time! Who can calculate in how 
many of those critical junctures when affi\irs of weightiest import 
hang upon the issue of an hour, prudence and forecast have 
triumphed over blind casualty, by being enabled to measure with 
precision the flight of time, in its smallest subdivisions. Is it 
not something more than mechanism, which watches with us by 
the sick-bed of some dear friend, through the live long solitude 
of night, enables us to count in the slackening pulse, nature's 
trembling steps toward recovery, and to adminster the prescribed 
remedy at the precise, perhaps the critical, moment of its appli- 
cation? By means of a watch, punctuality in all his duties — 
which, in its perfection, is one of the incommunicable attributes of 
Deity — is brought in no mean measure, within the reach of man. 
He is enabled, if he will be guided by this half-rational machine, 
creature of a day as he is, to imitate that sublime precision which 
leads the earth, after a circuit of five hundred millions of miles, 
back to the solstice at the appointed moment, without the loss of 
one second, no, not the millionth part of a second, for the ages 
on ages during which it has travelled that empyreal road. What 
a miracle of ait, that a man may teach a few brass wheels, and a 
little piece of elastic steel, to out-calculate himself; to give him 
a rational answer to one of the most important questions which a 
being travelling towards eternity can ask! What a miracle that 
a man can put within (his little machine a spiiit that measures 
the flight of time with greater accuracy than the unassisted in- 
tellect of the profoundest phylosopher; which watches and moves 
when sleep palsies alike the hand of the maker and the mind of 
the contriver, na}^, when the last sleep has come over them 
botli." 

Time was — and not long since — when labor saving machinery 
was regarded, parliculaily by those employed at physical labor, 



74 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

as a bane to society. Such a theory is evidently paradoxical, 
and, w ith other fallacies, has been consigned lo the tomb. When 
I was young — ^'as yet I am not old" — it was exceedingly rare to 
see a journeyman mechanic moving from city to city in any 
manner other than by the action of his own feet and legs, himself 
filling the capacity of ^^porter" for his own baggage. Now, he 
may be seen traversing the country in Rail Road Cars, and on 
the beautiful wooden palaces that are impelled by steam on our 
rivers and lakes; and if industrious, temperate, intelligent, and 
economical, the wnfe of his bosom may be better clad than was 
the voluptuous Queen of E^ypt. The cause of such change in 
the condition, is to be found in those productions which have 
cheapened the necessaries and the luxuries of life. Whosoever, 
therefore, increases production by efforts of the mind or body, 
economizes labor; contributes to national wealth and indepen- 
dence, and promotes the cause of civilization. 

It is true that the distribution of the products of industry has 
not always been made with an impartial hand, nor can any sys- 
tem be successfully adopted which can, in all respects, equalize 
the condition of men in point of wealth; and it is equally true, 
and much to be deplored, that physical labor too often receives 
the scanty share. The great panacea for the pecuniary condition 
of the physical laborer, is mental culture. Intelligence creates a 
spirit of independence; — assists labor to employ ils cunning to 
personal as well as general advantage , and makes the workman 
proud of his toil. 

The Maryland Institute for the promotion of the Mechanic 
Arts, w^as instituted for noble purposes. Its objects, are the en- 
couragmentof industry, skill, and genius; to inspire an emulation 
to excel in the products of human labor; to awaken the young 
mechanic to the necessit}^ of cultivating the sciences and to impart 
to him the rationale of his vocation; and to sustain by all laud- 
able efforts the dignity and nobility of labor. 

To the citizens of Baltimore in general the Institute promises 
the greatest advantages. Its beneficial tendencies in making 
Baltimore the great mart, where the South and the West may be 
supplied with all matters that the wants may indicate, should in- 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 75 

duce every citizen to lend a helping hand to render it effective. 
It has been in existence less than three years, and this, its third 
annual exhibition, will in the display of articles useful and orna- 
mental, not discreditably compare with the recent similar exhibi- 
tions of New York, Philadelphia and Boston. There are upwards 
of six hundred contibuting members to the same, embracing in 
the number, the ingenious and skilful Winans, Reeder, Murray, 
Rogers the Patrick Lyon of Baltimore, and others distinguished 
for their knowledge of the sciences and the arts, as well as for 
their probity of character and public spirit. It has a library em- 
bracing, in addition to works of a miscellaneous character, the 
best authors on the arts and the sciences, and is a subscriber to near- 
ly all of the periodicals, published in America and Europe, upon 
those subjects. It has a school of design, which is kept open 
four months in each year, at which youths as well as adults are 
taught. This department of the Institute will be of incalculable 
benefit to those branches of mechanism which put in requisition 
the pencil, the dividers, and the scale; and to those who are, or 
may be, apprenticed to such branches of industry, it opens a new 
field for culture and improvement. Upwards of eighty persons, 
mostly minors, were taught at the last session of this school, and 
it is probable that, at the approaching session, more than double 
that number will be admitted. Junior Members of the Institute 
who are required to pay two dollais and fifty cents for the first 
year of membership and one dollar and fifty cents per year there- 
after, are entitled to all the privileges of adult members with the 
single exception of voting at the meetings of the Institute. The 
exhibitions, lectures, library, and school of design, are all open to 
them. 

What a field for improvement is thus presented to the appren- 
tice! Let him embrace it in his youth, and it will strew fiowers 
in the path of his vigorous manhood, and down on the pillow of 
his old age: he will reflect honor upon his craft, and the labor of 
his hands will inure to his comfort and happiness: he will con- 
tribute to the elevation of the standaid of virtuous industry — 
that industry which will be appreciated and admired when the 
crown and the scepi re shall be "niuiibcrcd with the ihi.igs that were." 



70 ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE 

"What is a king with his courtly train? 

The king in his marble hall; 
Measured by hinn who, through pleasure and pain, 

Lifts upward the granite wall. 
The trowel shall live when the sceptre is gone, 

And the monarch sleeps in shame, 
The artizan builds in the deathless stone 

To himself a pillar of fame." 

At the approaching season, there will be delivered before the 
Institute, a course of lectures upon interesting and instructive 
subjects, and the enterprising coinniittee on lectures have secured 
for that occasion, the services of the Hon. Lewis Cass, Hon. S. 
H. Foote, Hon. James Brooks; Professors Henry, Bache, 
Maury, Johnson, and other gentlemen distinguished for their 
abilities as orators and teachers. 

The Legislature of Maryland, convinced of the utility of hold- 
ing annual fairs, where the productions of American invention 
and skill should be exhibited, at its last session passed a resolu- 
tion appropriating annually five hundred dollars to the support of 
the Maryland Institute. The City Council of Baltimore at the 
late session, in the exercise of that generosity and public spirit 
which characterizes the City of Baltimore, and most faithfully 
represented in that body, appropriated fifteen thousand dollars 
towards constructing a hall for the use of the Institute on the 
ground now occupied by the upper Centre Market-house. This 
latter appropriation is contingent upon the raising by the Insti- 
tute of the additional sum of money necessary to the completion 
of the building. The utility of such a structure for purposes 
other than holding fairs, superadded to the beautifying of the 
city, commends the project to public favor. It is estimated that 
the cost for erecting the same, in addition to the city's donation, 
will be fifty thousand dollars. Twenty-five thousand dollars in 
stock shares have already been subscribed; and the public will, 
in the course of a few days, be called on to subscribe to the 
balance of the stock. The value of each share of stock is five 
dollars, and which will, it is confidently believed, produce a 
dividend of seven per cent per annum. 

To you, ladies and gentlemen, in behalf of the Institute, I 
appeal for aid in this laudable enterprise. All who feel an in- 



THE MARYLAND INSTITUTE. 77 

terest in the prosperity of our growing city; all who desire ihat 
intelliorence and nnoraliiv shall be diffused throus^hout (he work- 
shops, and those who would elevate the character of labor, siiould 
give to our undertaking a cordial and substantial support. I 
trust that the appeal will not prove fruitless! In the name of 
the Institute I thank those who are exliibiiors at this fair, and 
earnestly solicit each one to renew the supply of articles at our 
future exhibitions, which will, doubtless, be held at the contem- 
plated new building, and which, from its capacity, will enable 
us to display, to the best advantage, all that may be contributed. 
The encouragement extended by visitors this year has far ex- 
ceeded the calculation of the most sanguine friends of the Insti- 
tute. That encouragement furnishes irrefragable evidence of 
the estimate which the public has placed upon the exertions of 
the meritorious ladies and gentlemen, the productions of whose 
skill have filled this hall. 

To the proprietors of the Baltimore press, and to (he en- 
terprising and gentlemardy corps of reporters therewith connect- 
ed, the Itistitute acknowledges i(s obligadon. 

To the gentlemen of Maryland who have pn(ronized the In- 
stitute by their visi(s, I tender the (hanks of its members, and to 
the ladies — God bless them! the Institute is indebted for its 
vitality, for without the countenance and support which (hey so 
liberally bes(owed at its first and second exhibitions, it would 
now sleep ''the sleep of death." Thanks to you, therefore, 
ladies for your continuance of those approving smiles which are 
the certain test of merit, and the greatest incentive to honorable 
ambition. 



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